[CF-Devel] Future crossfire changes/projects

[Yann Chachkoff]

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     I am Bjoern, aka Zack42. I am the creator of Yarid's house in
     
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     Scorn, which some of you might know.
     
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You asked what we think about your ideas on Crossfire, so here is my answer.

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     To decide about the future directions of CF, there needs to be a
     
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     consensus about the overall goal.
     
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     To my understanding, the overall goal is to significantly enlarge
     
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     the player base of CF. In other words, to attract, to pull, many
     
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     more new players on the CF platform.
     
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     Second, to attract many new players, one needs to know what most, if
     
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     not almost all, players want.
     
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How refreshing it is to see that there are still people interested in players 
demands !

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     Well, new players don't come because technology is nice. They don't
     
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     come because the source code is open. They dont come because a new
     
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     level 80 spell xyz has been implemented etc...you know what I
     
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     mean...
     
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     All players play to have fun and a good and exciting gaming
     
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     experience. If you meet this demand, they will come. Otherwise
     
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     they will not come.
     
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     Definitely agree. You made me notice one strange thing: the discussion about 
what Crossfire should/should not become takes place on the developer's list, 
not on the general crossfire list. Many players only subscribe to the general 
mailing list, and they may have good ideas to share. Why don't we continue the 
debate on the general list then ?

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     So, what is needed to meet these demands and expectations ?
     
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     In my opinion, CF needs improvement in 3 top-level areas:
     
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     * Improve Presentation
     
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         ** generally : support richer media types
     
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         ** better sounds
     
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         ** better graphics
     
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         ** ambient sounds
     
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         ** soundtracks
     
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         (** video clips / cut scenes / stills?  -> who would be able
     
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                    to produce them ?)
     
     Maybe creating a new mailing list about the 'multimedia' part of Crossfire 
would be a good idea... It is indeed true that _many_ potential players found 
the Crossfire graphics 'out-of-date', sounds 'crappy', moves 'ugly' (only 
square-by-square move ? Even in Zelda I, that was made better !). The 
potential of the game is huge, but many people don't like it just because it 
looks so ugly and outdated. Serious multimedia development is now needed if we 
want to see more players.

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     * Improve Content
     
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         ** CF background setting / story
     
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         ** Consistent World design (world map)
     
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         ** high quality Stories, Quests, "Epic Quests" (compare Everquest)
     
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         ** New Player experience
     
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     * Improve Game Mechanics / Logic
     
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         ** Monster & NPC  AI
     
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     I tend to bind those two points for now... Making high-quality stories and 
quests is currently a very difficult task because of lack of advanced 
'scenaristic' capabilities in Crossfire (I mean: nearly inexistent NPC AI, 
poor dynamic map support, etc.). The maps are now often too 'static' and 
door-monster-treasure-designed. Some attempts do exist (The quest of Lord 
Eureca for example), but the infrastructure of crossfire is too limited to 
build really complex quests. I think the scenario is much more important than 
the source code, but we can't write good stories without some basic tools to 
support them. Maybe the crossfire map designers should try to make a list of 
what they want to be possible in the game so the developers would have an idea 
on what to do.

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     That is what I think needs to be adressed to significantly grow the
     
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     player base of CF...
     
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     What do you think ?
     
     That's what I think too. But it needs lots of work and also a major change of 
the main crossfire development path (switching from a 
'coders->designers->players' model to a 'players->designers->coders' model), 
and that may be the most difficult part of the run.

Chachkoff Y.

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