Originally posted by Nurling:

Originally posted by CrazyWithPower:

nothing is perfect and there is no need for magic just asking as someone that doesnt know much about programing and the such but has heard that unity is not of the best out there so just wandering if valheim can be as big as the devs envisioned

Are you talking about the vision where the game has 100's of players and giant cities stretching from coast to coast, and towers reaching the moon?

yeah something like that in a way is the engine even capable to the task regardless of the skill of the programmer?

but like retsam1 said it will depend of on your pc but i hope in wont end up being at the higher end for the "full" experience

1) hard to say. But it feels like they have put in a number of ideas, above +
- armor stand was heavily asked for
- unarmed weapon was asked for
- mounts were asked for
and so on.

2) Yes, I bet they play. And I feel it is a key part of success: if you don't play it, you run out of ideas I think. But playing it, you find something you don't like and think "I wish we had a whatever" or "this interface is terrible" or "hey, that is a bug" etc.

3) I think unity has a bad rap. It may not be the fastest, but this game shouldn't be the most demanding either. The performance could be just untweaked code. The rule is get it working and done, profile it, find the bottlenecks, attack those. They are on step 1.

4) hmm. I think it was when I got my first stonecutter and not long after a brutal raid .. I realized there was much more to building and that unlike many games, your home actually matters instead of just being a cosmetic playground.

Originally posted by hallaloth:

1) Its hard to say because most dev teams aren't going to answer that question directly. We don't know the entirety of their vision and there could be things players really want that the dev team intends to put time into later. They've definitely taken time to balance things and keep on top of bugs at the very least. . .most of which they couldn't do without at least listening to what people are saying.

2) I'm sure a lot of what they play is more 'play testing' than just playing the game. When your work day consists of building a game you may want to step back and play something else when you get home. However, given the scope of Valheim and the love we can see for it, I imagine they do take a few minutes here and there to just enjoy it.

3) I think its been stated that optimization is something they intend on working on once the game is finished. I don't have a source for that, but I thought that that had been stated somewhere.

4) Its been the little things. The Sunrise coming up over the meadows. Just the freedom to build something awesome. The enjoyment of getting people together and letting everyone do what they enjoy and still being able to progress. It's also just a pretty game for its simplicity.

1. Go to youtube and to Jiroc the viking's channel. He's interviewed many on the dev team who have answered questions they and others posed. Lots of information there.

Also, a dev recently posted 2 posts on a thread here answering some points made by others:

https://steamcommunity.com/app/892970/discussions/0/5456682769569364392/?ctp=3

So devs are interacting with players in these regards, the only issue is that, like most dev teams, they don't consolidate such information specifically catering on the steam forums.

2. A dev on jiroc's channel specified they actually play in their free time.

3. I swear I see this silliness on so so many EA games. Optimizations (for the most part) occur at the end of a development cycle and so many game's devs speak to this. One of the main reasons why is that development is a fluid process and if you optimize at each and every step and things change, you've wasted too much labor/cost in "optimizing" that was completely a waste of time. You do of course small optimizations just to help make some additions work but you do so limitedly to account for the expectations of changes later.

Its like how most authors do not write one page of a novel and edit/optimize it then write the next. Most write the novel and then go back and edit significantly as needed. The reason why is what happens on page 3 at first writing may need to be changed due to what happens on page 343. Or that the author gets to the end and decides to rewrite the entire first chapter to better set up the climax and denouement of the story.

Valheim's ice caves/cult of the wolf actually may be a good example of that.

But also not a small number of instances of "optimization" demands by players aren't what game devs as a whole define as optimization either. Ark is a perfect example where some player complain "the game isn't optimized" yet when exploring the reasons why they lament that, it turns out they had comps not mean to either play the game period or that they expected to play the game at the best graphic fidelity and performance when their comp just barely met the minimum requirements to play and not even close to recommended or higher.

4. People always want more/different for the most part. Some want simplicity others want to have massive expectations for something to be massive and adding things they want because of their "vision"/perception of what the game should be. Bottom line though, its mostly and more importantly primarily a decision of the devs and players, while able to be listened do, are mostly just along for the ride.

One semi benefit to when something has good foundational simplicity with a game like this one is how that translates to letting players' imaginations and creativity to fill their wants/needs instead of being an on the rails style game.

Even on the dev team differences shape the game. Head of the game didn't want -any- portals in valheim. Second in command wanted portals to allow anything. A compromise was reached and only metal wasn't allowed. Its all a fluid process, especially given what I've read/listed to concerning their team's approach to development.

1) Its hard to say because most dev teams aren't going to answer that question directly. We don't know the entirety of their vision and there could be things players really want that the dev team intends to put time into later. They've definitely taken time to balance things and keep on top of bugs at the very least. . .most of which they couldn't do without at least listening to what people are saying.

2) I'm sure a lot of what they play is more 'play testing' than just playing the game. When your work day consists of building a game you may want to step back and play something else when you get home. However, given the scope of Valheim and the love we can see for it, I imagine they do take a few minutes here and there to just enjoy it.

3) I think its been stated that optimization is something they intend on working on once the game is finished. I don't have a source for that, but I thought that that had been stated somewhere.

4) Its been the little things. The Sunrise coming up over the meadows. Just the freedom to build something awesome. The enjoyment of getting people together and letting everyone do what they enjoy and still being able to progress. It's also just a pretty game for its simplicity.

There is no magic solution to performance. List some games with perfect optimizations and I'll tell you exactly why they wouldn't work.

Originally posted by Nurling:

There is no magic solution to performance. List some games with perfect optimizations and I'll tell you exactly why they wouldn't work.

Pong.

Originally posted by Nurling:

There is no magic solution to performance. List some games with perfect optimizations and I'll tell you exactly why they wouldn't work.

nothing is perfect and there is no need for magic just asking as someone that doesnt know much about programing and the such but has heard that unity is not of the best out there so just wandering if valheim can be as big as the devs envisioned

Originally posted by CrazyWithPower:

nothing is perfect and there is no need for magic just asking as someone that doesnt know much about programing and the such but has heard that unity is not of the best out there so just wandering if valheim can be as big as the devs envisioned

Are you talking about the vision where the game has 100's of players and giant cities stretching from coast to coast, and towers reaching the moon?

1) I think the devs listen to the community more than we realize. An example would be when everyone complained after foods were drastically nerfed in H&H, then they decided to buff them back to some normalcy soon after. Another example is how people asked for a way to trash items for a long time, and we finally got it in the form of a giant lightning rod that “obliterates” your items.

2) I think they do play the game, but maybe only in certain sections. During testing, it’s likely they only test the game at the specific point of what they’re changing (e.g spawning in gear before going into a new biome to skip progression), and it’s possible that they don’t play through the entire game every time there’s an update to get the whole “feel” anymore.

3) There are a lot of optimization problems, especially with huge builds, so changing from unity could help. The issue is that they’ve built a lot of the game on it, so I don’t see them changing it anytime soon.

4) I remember riding my raft over to a new island and meeting a serpent on the way. It was stormy and dark, and I was terrified. I made it across, thankfully, and I was rewarded with the trader as well as a mountains and swamp. I found lots of new things for my discovery, so I wanted to keep on sailing!