First Impressions

Or "just how big of a let down is the multiplayer matchmaking issue?"

from Demigod Forums

Hey Demigod forums. I'll preface this by saying that I was one of the many of you who pre-ordered this game to get into the beta. I played through the first two updates, and then decided I was done messing around with what I was afraid might end up as a half-baked DOTA clone.

I recently installed Demigod (a week ago, in fact) only to discover, much to my delight, that what I was afraid would be a half-baked DOTA clone had actually turned out to be a very refined and unique experience. The game was still visually stunning but contained much more polish than the beta I remembered. The demigods all had more thoughtfully designed skill trees than I remembered. The whole citadel upgrading mechanic was entirely new to me. I was overjoyed to find all of these things (and, of course, much more) - so much so that I convinced a friend of mine to buy the game. We played a great number of LAN games together privately before I even thought to try out multiplayer in the online arena.

This brings me to my point, which is one you are all familiar with (I think): the execution of the matchmaking system in this game, in spite of what is surely a great sum of effort and ingenuity on behalf of Stardock and Gas Powered Games, is.. well, it doesn't work. There is no need to describe why it doesn't work, because regardless of whether it is the result of a piece of faulty infrastructure, a rogue algorithm, gremlins or trolls, the bottom line is that I have played four Pantheon games today, and not a single one involved me playing against real people.

The point of this post / rant / flame is to vent my frustration over the failure of this system, which I would argue is one of the most invaluable elements of the game in terms of its (the game's) longevity. It severly pains me to see such a gorgeous game suffer so much on account of this oversight bug not-properly-functioning system.

Comments? Thoughts? Flame?

~ Aariel

 

 

1,614 views 14 replies
Reply #1 from Demigod Forums Top

The networking issues of Demigod has been the hot topic of discussion on the forums and the top priority of the devs to fix since its release. If you read the Demigod Journals subforum, you'll notice that the devs are throwing everything they have, including the kitchen sink, at it. Give it time, it will be resolved.

That said, welcome to the forums! That's a civil and well constructed rant indeed!

Reply #2 from Demigod Forums Top

Thanks for the suggestion! I've been pouring over everything that has been posted on the subject, actually, and I suppose I should point out that my rant isn't meant to be a "omg devs wtf please fix this bug" rant.

It's really more of a "of all the problems this game could have, this is surely one of the worst" observation - coupled with a helpful portion of incredulity, since, from where I'm standing as a long-time player of games, even less-user-friendly, so-called matchmaking systems (battle.net, or the server list of *name your FPS here*) have been infinitely more effective than the one currently featured in Demigod. There is no single player campaign - not even a tutorial - in this game. This game is targetted at people who are familiar with this online experience and come to the table with expectations that have been set in stone for years. Bad impressions like this have the terrible habit of burying great games in the annals of history (sorry, I think some of my risidual upset about Advent Rising is spilling over at this point).

I definitely looking forward to the day these issues are resolved, and as a great fan of Stardock and Gas Powered Games, I will continue to keep tabs on this game faithfully. It's the part of me that knows what a missed opportunity this problem represents that will never forget it.

[edit]

Oh, and my hope was to spark some discussion on just how vital a feature like this actually is for games like this these days, but maybe it's all universally understood and I'm just another person venting frustration over the same issue for the millionth time - if so, humblest apologies!

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Reply #3 from Demigod Forums Top

No apologies needed. You approached the issue with a calm and open mind. Multiplayer is what Demigod is all about, so it's expected that frustrations will arise when what it's about doesn't work. The important thing is that instead of abusing the annonymity of the internet to throw an e-tandrum, you stated your problem clearly and called attention to your concerns in a civilised manner.

Here's to hoping that the issue gets fixed soon, then those concerned with not being able to play online can finally complain about the next big thing...gameplay balances (or imbalances)!

Reply #4 from Demigod Forums Top

If the gameplay itself wasn't so good, I would have given up on this game a while ago, but I really can't see myself quitting something this good over something that can be fixed....although it does seem more and more fictional that it can be fixed than fact as the days go by.

Reply #5 from Demigod Forums Top

Personally, I never liked ranked ladders; I just play custom games, and with each patch I've noticed that I am able to find more games (maybe more people are just showing up, though. That's still good!), and now, instead of rarely getting a match to work, practially 100% of all matches will work fine unless somebody doesn't like somebody elses ping.

Reply #6 from Demigod Forums Top

I have found that custom games provide the best experience.  Give a few a shot!  They are a great deal of fun :D  

Reply #7 from Demigod Forums Top

I´m really sad about so many people playing over Hamachi...

It would be so fuckin nice, if all players played on normal online... I mean they dont let you pay 13 € a month and thats what they get for this. All those bastards suck so hard

Reply #8 from Demigod Forums Top

If the gameplay itself wasn't so good, I would have given up on this game a while ago, but I really can't see myself quitting something this good over something that can be fixed....although it does seem more and more fictional that it can be fixed than fact as the days go by.

I'm in total agreement here - again, what pains me the most is that I know a lot of people are willing to shun the game because of the bad taste the multiplayer experience leaves in their mouths.

Personally, I never liked ranked ladders; I just play custom games, and with each patch I've noticed that I am able to find more games (maybe more people are just showing up, though. That's still good!), and now, instead of rarely getting a match to work, practially 100% of all matches will work fine unless somebody doesn't like somebody elses ping.

I have found that custom games provide the best experience.  Give a few a shot!  They are a great deal of fun   

 

Thanks for the suggestion! I'll definitely look into this while playing today =] it would be really fun to be able to participate in a tournament, though..

Reply #9 from Demigod Forums Top

Eh, the "tournament" is, AFAIK, just a bunch of skirmishes with whichever side you pick gaining favor. I'm not really sure if there is anything special about it. >.>

Reply #10 from Demigod Forums Top

Eh, the "tournament" is, AFAIK, just a bunch of skirmishes with whichever side you pick gaining favor. I'm not really sure if there is anything special about it. >.>

Oh, interesting - I was under the impression that there was some kind of ladder player ranking system involved.. isn't that what this is? http://pantheon.demigodthegame.com/rankings/overall/

Reply #11 from Demigod Forums Top

Regarding the earlier suggestion that I should just play custom games for now, I just got out of my first one. Basically it was going well for about fifteen minutes until someone died and decided that it would be cool to randomly quit the game at that point. Ordinarilly, this isn't a game stopping situation, but everyone in the game was promptly hammered with neverending "desync detected" popup errors which basically made the game entirely unplayable. Whoever designed the user experience for this game should be slapped across the face with a salmon =.=;

[edit]

This reminds me of a similar issue that seemed to occur in Supreme Commander games when that title was first released. So how about it, was it just a fluke? Or is this a long-standing, gorilla-in-the-room issue that no-one will take responsibility for or has the money to fix?

Reply #12 from Demigod Forums Top

I've see huge improvements in connectivity in pantheon since the last update (I've never had issues with custom games), but still have a friend who can't even join a custom game, so I totally understand the frustration.  Hope the remaining issues are resolved!

Reply #13 from Demigod Forums Top

Quoting LionAariel, reply 11
Regarding the earlier suggestion that I should just play custom games for now, I just got out of my first one. Basically it was going well for about fifteen minutes until someone died and decided that it would be cool to randomly quit the game at that point. Ordinarilly, this isn't a game stopping situation, but everyone in the game was promptly hammered with neverending "desync detected" popup errors which basically made the game entirely unplayable. Whoever designed the user experience for this game should be slapped across the face with a salmon =.=;

[edit]

This reminds me of a similar issue that seemed to occur in Supreme Commander games when that title was first released. So how about it, was it just a fluke? Or is this a long-standing, gorilla-in-the-room issue that no-one will take responsibility for or has the money to fix?
End of LionAariel's quote

Soon as patch 1.01 comes out, most of that waiting 30 seconds for each person will be gone.  Unless they truly have disconnected by natural causes like lightning storms or cats pulling out the cables..

Reply #14 from Demigod Forums Top

Replying to the guy referencing SupCom when it first came out.

Yes. If you notice the "stardock impulse" is almost exactly the same as GPGnet, I think they just copied over large swaths of code from SupCom and GPGnet software, but didnt check it carefully enough to see how it meshed with the new content/ game structure.

So now were going through the same revision process SupCom had (and still has to some extent) Hopefully well get quicker fixes this time.