over 1 year ago - Ashes of Creation - Direct link

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10s thank you
15s [Music]
28s hello everyone and welcome to another
32s glorious live stream day I'm super
34s excited to be with you guys show you
36s what we've been working on and I have
39s the absolute privilege of being joined
41s by two of our Stellar developers helping
45s bring the world of Vera to life for all
48s of us
49s one of our glorious designers Mr Corey
53s how are you doing Corey I'm doing great
55s super excited to be here excited to have
57s you here I'm excited to to go through
60s with the community and get some awesome
63s feedback on the changes that have
66s happened since Alpha One Last year to a
70s lot of our
72s resource systems to the economy as a
75s whole and I know that you and the other
77s designers have been working hard
80s um
80s looking at the feedback that players
82s have given from recent games they played
85s and and thinking about how with further
88s details along some of our systems like
90s Land Management and how they've
91s influenced some of these changes since
92s Alpha One
93s and we are also joined by one of our
98s absolutely phenomenal senior gameplay
101s Engineers Mr Alex how you doing buddy
105s I'm doing pretty well excited to be here
107s excited to have you as well because of
109s course
111s the magic lives in the code and you have
115s done an awesome job in helping design
119s and bring to life the desires that they
121s have for this system and we're going to
123s get into I think some fun discussion
125s about what it took to make some of this
128s stuff possible so
132s community may already be aware
134s um this
136s live stream this demonstration is going
138s to be about our gathering and harvesting
141s systems and you know while we are hard
144s at work and getting things ready for
145s Alpha 2
146s there have been some
149s um significant changes in the direction
151s of how we're approaching General
154s harvestables within the world and we
156s want to be able to to obviously show you
158s guys that
160s um I think you know right now we're
161s recording this on on Thursdays this is
163s pre-recorded um tomorrow is live stream
165s day I've asked the community team to
167s prepare some of the older references
170s from Alpha One and what Gathering looked
173s like there and of course you guys knew
174s that that
175s you know in development we're always
178s showing you guys Works in progress and
180s those Works in progress change over time
183s um and now you guys are going to get an
184s opportunity to see
187s um where it's at now you likely just saw
189s an example of where it was last year
192s and I think you are going to be
195s pleasantly surprised and excited to see
197s some of these changes where do you guys
199s think we should start first Alex Corey
203s oh I think we should lock down one of
205s those trees uh I think so though okay so
208s my first question Corey
210s do I have to pick a specific tree or can
214s I chop down any of these trees
218s you can chop down any tree you want
220s just pick one that you like
223s and just take that Lumber oh my goodness
227s all right so to that's that is probably
229s the first major reveal is that
234s in ashes of creation
237s we have now
239s expanded the resource Gathering system
242s to include
245s a great many of what the world is
248s showing you of these resources so when
250s you see a tree you can chop a tree if
253s you see a rock you can mine a rock
256s and
258s before we actually chop this tree down I
261s want to tell you that I have played a
263s lot of MMOs I played a lot of games
266s and I don't think I have ever seen
270s a tree fall
273s to this high of a visual Fidelity
275s standard
277s before
278s and let me just chop this down and then
281s we can talk about what it took to get
283s here
284s all right does this tree look good
285s should we chop this one down has the
287s angle here we're going to get a nice
288s view from this angle okay all right
291s let's just chop them
296s I love the new UI oh I know
300s and the sound get ready it's happening
305s oh my gosh look at the dust kick up look
309s at the canopy of the tree get impacted
312s and when it falls wait wait that's not
315s all as it dissolves it comes back and it
319s grows
320s and of course we are speeding up this
323s growth stage right Alex
325s yeah yeah okay yeah so we're speeding
327s this up now to just to give you guys an
329s idea of how these assets regrow in the
332s world
333s and Alex talk to me a little bit about
335s what it took to to get that
337s physics-based Collision actually working
341s like that because that was impressive
344s oh let me just begin with the amount of
346s visibility reviews we had to go through
348s to in order to achieve this I remember
350s when I first talked to you about having
353s the canopy get rigged and and actually
357s have that physics component I think your
359s your eyes grew like 50 wider
362s uh yeah physics is a wild beast it's
366s very hard to tame
368s especially in MMOs yeah absolutely so
371s what what exactly did it take to to make
374s that
375s that uh that canopy fold like that
379s uh well yeah basically what happens is
383s um when you shop down the tree uh we
385s swap out uh the static mesh which you
387s see in front of you um to a skeletal
389s mesh which then we simulate physics and
391s apply force uh to the direction we want
394s the tree to fall and when the tree falls
397s down we have colliders on tree branches
400s that impact the ground and as they did
403s parks in ground it also impacts the stem
405s of the tree and making this effect that
408s you just saw
410s I mean it looks great I honestly I mean
413s have you guys ever played an MMO with
415s that type of of tree visual falling
420s I don't no not really definitely not
423s usually just mostly animations or it's
425s just converts straight into Lumber and
427s then they just you know just drops yeah
429s what I'm accustomed to is like just
431s watching the branches kind of you know
433s intersect through the ground
436s you know after it falls and then it just
438s disappears
439s um but of course as you guys know
442s you know in building ashes we're really
445s aiming for a very high visual Fidelity
447s bar
448s um
449s and I think this type of system really
452s complements that goal it's incredibly
455s immersive
457s um
458s and it it feels good
460s now of course this stuff is all a work
462s in progress still right this is uh oh
464s this is going to land let's see that
466s physics uh okay that's not bad that's
469s pretty good
471s this is what I was telling you about
472s taming the physics yeah exactly
476s oh that that felt pretty good now of
479s course
480s um you know there's a there's a lot that
482s goes into
484s making a world that's filled with this
488s amount of of resources that can be
491s gathered Corey talk to me a little bit
493s about what this change
496s um in really widening up the amount of
500s resources and changing those
502s classifications to to General resources
504s that are harvestable what does that look
506s like from an economy design perspective
509s well I mean it allows us to to leverage
513s um some of some of our other systems
515s um like uh one of our previous live
517s streams was it was about Seasons right
519s and
521s um you know the the changes that could
523s come from Seasons
524s um what could be growing what could be
526s dropping in this season versus another
528s one right
530s um so uh the
533s the the change to have everything that
536s you see uh gatherable kind of uh allows
540s us to attach the changes that you see
541s during the seasons to all the
543s gatherables that you see
545s um so the information that you learn
546s from season to season and about each
549s each gatherable
551s um will be valuable to you as as a
554s gatherer and
557s yeah absolutely and then the other thing
559s is you know when we talk about like for
563s example looking at this this rock here I
567s don't know what that rock is before I
570s actually complete the Harvest but after
572s I complete the Harvest I see that I
573s collected Basalt in the bottom right
575s hand corner
576s talk to me a little bit about kind of
578s that decision and what that means yeah
580s totally so so
582s um you know there's a bunch of different
583s things in ashes that will be gatherable
585s right we have good plants and trees and
587s rocks and fish and uh that animals and
590s creatures that can be tamed right and
593s um you know
594s we're thinking to reach the visual
596s Fidelity bar and to have things a little
598s bit more rooted in uh what we know is
601s that um it wouldn't really make sense
603s for you to see gold all over the world
605s the same way that you would like you
606s know plant some trees so we wanted to
609s get feedback on what players think about
612s um you know some of the different
613s gatherable types having kind of
615s different things that you would have to
617s know and expect from them so rocks are a
619s good example of this where you know you
621s you can see a rock but until you crack
623s that thing open you don't know if it's
625s full of stone
626s um crystals rubies gold
628s um so uh we wanted to try that out with
632s with some of our gatherables to to have
634s players have to open this thing up and
637s that's not to say that we players won't
639s stumble on a nice load or vein or geode
642s of gold but most of the stuff that they
645s would they would find to the world
646s unless they they look hard enough
648s um would require them to crack that
651s Stone open right and of course there are
655s additional systems some that we haven't
657s really gone into too much detail on but
661s um as an example surveying play can play
665s a key role in helping players to
668s identify
670s locations of rare resources within an
673s area is that correct
675s yeah definitely talk to me a little bit
678s about surveying
679s yeah so surveying um is a way that
681s players can
683s um check out an area for for resources
686s um so players can learn where resources
689s are that are that are static and that
691s grow back in the same location but we'll
694s also have resources and Ashes that can
696s spawn anywhere so surveying will help
699s players locate those those resources so
702s if they're looking for something
703s specific they can hunt them down
705s surveying will also allow players to
708s uncover hidden resources that players
710s wouldn't be able to see with their with
712s their naked eye
714s another thing that a surveying would
717s provide is some of the information that
718s we're talking about before right
720s um like for instance
722s um if you survey uh and inside of your
725s your survey area there's you know plants
727s um you might learn when that plant uh
730s what season that plant likes to grow it
732s um you might learn uh whether it likes
734s to be watered during the winter versus
738s how it likes to be watered in the summer
739s uh you might see I see that this the
742s interior of this rock now has ore in it
746s uh yeah see you found one with some uh
749s with some iron so not all those rocks
751s are are just you know slabs of assault
753s you might might find some iron maybe
755s some gold maybe some copper we'll see oh
758s that is super cool uh this one was also
760s iron very nice
762s it looks like you found a little little
764s iron deposit there and so so when
766s players interact with the Survey System
770s talk to me a little bit about what that
772s interaction looks like what exactly does
776s the survey
777s gameplay layer
779s feel like
781s yeah so um you'd work with a surveying
785s tool and you set the the surveying tool
787s down and that tool would have a a
789s specific area
791s um in which it it's able to uncover and
794s extract information about the resources
796s that are in the area
798s um
799s so you know as as a starting out
802s gatherer you might end up with one of
804s the tools right but as you as you
806s progress and become
808s more proficient with using the tool you
810s might be able to set up additional
812s pylons and extend the uh the area of
814s your survey
819s um right and so that allows you to start
821s kind of making shapes and having more
823s strategic areas that you're that you're
825s surveying right if you could connect
827s multiple pylons to create a shape you
830s know maybe you could follow the uh the
833s um the twisting caverns of the cave uh
835s maybe if you're out in the open like we
837s are here you could just try and make
839s yourself a a nice wide widen shape to uh
843s scan as much of the area as possible so
845s it'll be it'll be up to the player to
847s um to be tricky with their surveying
850s tool to try and get the most uh
851s efficiency out of their survey okay I
855s would like to to point out one thing is
858s that um are these Apple bushes
862s I'm collecting apples and they're like
864s from a bush
865s they are they are from a bush that is
867s awesome
869s dude hey this is a Vera I know this is
872s this is Vera there are apples that grow
874s on bushes
875s uh so this the Survey System I think is
878s one that's really cool because it also
881s all is a part of this kind of cohesive
886s um
888s Land Management System right
891s um is that resources spawn at a set rate
894s and that rate can be influenced by how
899s other players are interfacing with the
903s resource system within a given area and
906s if there is a high traffic and a high
909s volume of interaction that is yielding
913s um these General resources or more
915s specific and bespoke resources then that
918s can have a deleterious effect on the
921s Land Management score of the area and
924s how does that affect the resource spawn
928s yeah it could be could be positive or
931s negative or or both uh simultaneously so
934s um the the land house value right turns
937s um ties into the health of a specific
940s ecosystem and the ecosystem can kind of
943s scale with uh different different
944s segment sizes of the world
947s um or the world itself a biome maybe a
949s maybe a node maybe the a player's
951s Freehold
953s um and the the things that a player does
955s um uh in those areas will contribute to
957s to Health in a positive or negative way
959s so you know doing something like
961s rotating your crops
963s might increase the the health of the
966s land because that's considered something
968s good to do
970s um and maybe apprehending
973s um or removing poachers that are over
975s hunting a a certain species could be
979s helpful to the health of the land uh
981s baby
983s um you know the mayor puts out a request
986s for players to try and get rid of
988s invasive species that are plants maybe
991s they're maybe they're overgrowing weed
993s and it's um it's stopping other um
996s valuable plants from growing yes
1000s and uh
1003s um yeah so so you know every every
1006s action would feed into to a positive
1009s thing in in one area for for the health
1011s of the land but it could also have
1013s repercussions in another right if a few
1016s over hunt Predators
1018s um the prey have no uh have no
1021s um uh Predators but
1024s um picking them off so the spawn rates
1027s of those uh you know those rabbits that
1029s the Wolves usually take care of could
1031s could go up
1032s um and maybe if you over hunt the
1034s rabbits uh the the Wolves want to find
1037s another place to go so
1039s um the the ecosystem health and land
1042s Health System allows us to really root
1045s players into the world and learn about
1047s their surroundings learn learn about uh
1050s what
1052s um repercussions their their actions
1053s have and work together to work within
1057s and manipulate that system
1059s all right are you telling me if my Land
1061s Management is poor and I cut down all
1062s the trees my land would just be bearing
1064s for
1065s like long periods of time
1067s yeah I could definitely extend the
1069s amount of time um that it would take for
1071s what you want to grow to grow back
1073s oh that's cool that is pretty cool and
1076s that is
1079s another component of how player activity
1083s or actions within the world have a
1088s visible and systemic effect
1092s on that world's economy and that helps
1094s to simulate the ebb and flow of supply
1099s chains of the prevalence in the locality
1105s of
1106s certain resources being depleted
1109s and having extended
1112s periods of time where the players go
1115s without that and that can spur the need
1118s for transiting materials across the
1121s world right
1122s exactly exactly
1125s that is pretty cool so are you saying
1128s I'm gonna have to travel to other notes
1129s and steal their Lumber
1131s well now that's a decision you need to
1134s make
1135s you need any help with that you can
1138s recruit me so I see here that
1141s um we have a particular type of flower
1143s that I believe only spawns in winter is
1147s that right
1148s yeah totally this is this is the gloomy
1150s Pro Set it's a beautiful flower but it
1152s can only be found uh in winter
1155s oh the next I love the uh I love I love
1159s the uh the effect that it just that
1161s flower just got wrecked yeah that
1163s sickle's doing work I know let me see if
1166s we can watch that flower regrow here
1168s does it regrow
1170s flower of course yes definitely should
1173s are you coming back Little Flower oh
1175s there it is I've we found it oh and it's
1178s in a bulb State I can't interact with it
1180s yet that is so cool it's not ready you
1182s want the petals so oh yeah and then
1184s actually to add to this each state has
1187s its own physics profile like it's so
1189s trees like you sell the
1191s um flowers right here and some profiles
1194s might not have any collision and some
1196s might have so for example as for trees
1199s sapling stage requires no Collision but
1202s the young stage will have a collision
1203s which no longer can uh you know go
1206s through oh that is pretty cool now
1209s um I mean sorry
1211s Slurpee is his gamertag uh Alex talk to
1215s me a little bit about
1217s um what you had to
1219s do to kind of make all of this
1221s performant right when you're
1223s when you're creating an environment with
1227s so many of these terrain actors these
1230s foliage actors
1232s being interactable that can have some
1236s potential performance issues how did you
1238s go about addressing that
1239s yeah you're correct uh this is a very
1241s difficult task and luckily for us in
1243s real four and real five provide tools
1246s for environment artists called foliage
1249s tool where you can just paint like trees
1252s paint flowers paint uh you know rocks
1255s like everything you see and it's very
1258s very performant because
1260s um you know artists paid thousands of
1262s them right and to make the world very
1264s immersive to make world like you know
1266s believable uh so what we've done is we
1269s uh basically use the same system and
1271s introduced a few States and the main
1274s point of that was to make it as seamless
1278s as possible for environment art to place
1280s those assets in the world and design
1284s being able to modify those uh data
1288s points to make it transitions between
1290s states
1292s that's pretty cool and you know
1294s obviously when you have potentially
1296s hundreds of different players that might
1300s be within close proximity uh as you and
1305s they're all in this environment
1306s interacting with those
1308s different elements of the terrain those
1311s different resources and gatherables this
1315s is a nice way for us to ensure that
1319s performance is is still good
1322s um
1323s correct I think the biggest uh thing
1326s would be here also networking is being
1328s able to uh have as less data as possible
1332s to uh send to the clients so it's more
1335s performant on the server that's cool one
1338s other thing I want to talk about is
1340s um
1341s is you will see here and I want to show
1344s you guys this that when you chop down
1348s this tree
1350s previously you had seen it kick up dust
1353s that was relevant for the season and the
1356s area and now what happens when we chop
1359s this tree down in winter
1361s let us see
1364s I hope it doesn't hit the deer oh that
1366s would be unfortunate I also hope it
1369s doesn't hit okay it's working we're good
1370s you're good dear don't you worry
1374s it kicks up snow
1377s what is that
1379s is that a sandal is that a sandal
1381s scarecrow
1382s it looks like it oh it's a sandal
1385s scarecrow up and we're in the face
1388s I think there was a collision of a
1390s skeleton mesh that's right that was cool
1392s this is awesome oh I love that that is
1396s so cool little sandal scarecrow oh and
1398s it's growing back
1400s yeah that is that is super cool
1402s um
1403s so there are really two main points of
1407s player feedback from this demonstration
1409s that I want you guys in the community to
1412s think about
1414s um when you are talking about what you
1416s saw today
1417s the first one is how do you guys feel
1421s about the change that is incorporating
1426s a much higher amount of gatherable
1431s gatherables in the environment right now
1435s obviously like I said these are General
1438s resources that are primarily geared
1440s towards construction and development of
1443s nodes the transit of materials across
1447s the world through Caravans
1449s repairs and then they are General
1452s resources uh that are used in a
1457s um uh in a uh much more foundational way
1462s of creating higher tier mats that then
1466s get used in recipes as well but how do
1470s you guys feel about that broadening of
1472s the resource resources available
1475s out in the wild and then the second
1479s thing that we want to get
1482s feedback on what was the second thing we
1484s wanted to get feedback on
1485s the uh the visual Fidelity that we're
1488s trying to reach oh right yes the visual
1491s Fidelity how do you guys feel about the
1493s visual Fidelity
1495s um of these trees and the Rocks
1499s um that are oh my gosh this one is going
1502s to take a while get ready that's a big
1504s tree it's a Timber
1507s oh my gosh now of course there are some
1511s things that we that you guys are not
1513s seeing here because they're not yet
1514s implemented but professions will of
1518s course
1519s um introduce layers of accessibility
1523s based on the type of resource the size
1526s of particular resources isn't that right
1528s Corey
1530s yeah definitely yeah um your progression
1532s within the the profession we'll uh we'll
1535s take account what tools you can use
1538s um there might even be some opportunity
1539s to uh do some gathering with other
1542s players uh that you know typically in
1544s other games that I play do you usually
1546s do the the Gathering alone you're
1548s venturing around alone and we wanted to
1550s uh take a look at maybe having a friend
1553s to help you with a true person saw on a
1555s larger tree
1557s um maybe there's uh some panning that
1559s you could do as opposed to just hitting
1562s uh or with the pickaxe so we'll have
1564s other tools that are part of that
1565s progression path and then other
1567s activities that uh players can do if
1570s they would like to gather together
1572s that is pretty cool and then on top of
1576s that progression within your profession
1578s can also
1580s um speed up the Gathering times that you
1583s have
1584s um and another important note is that
1586s like as these resources reach different
1589s stages of their maturity in coming back
1592s right you see that plant kind of um
1594s growing back
1596s you could potentially access the
1598s resources at earlier stages as well by
1601s having high advancement within a certain
1604s profession is that correct yeah exactly
1607s um the speed the the time at which
1610s you're able to access them maybe the the
1612s amount that the thing yields will all
1614s kind of tie into your your expertise at
1617s that uh individual Gathering profession
1619s and also the uh the um
1622s uh things that you're using to do the
1624s Gathering oh can I highlight one
1626s additional thing yeah I love I love the
1628s new UI for interaction yeah thank you
1631s thank you so much to Colby and Natalie
1633s and Jeff and all the UI team and I'll
1636s take this opportunity to thank
1637s engineering and and art at Tech art too
1639s like you know Stephen had mentioned
1642s um that we came with the crazy idea of
1645s reaching this visual Fidelity bar and
1647s being Mia's being a gathering player
1649s myself like I spend a whole lot of time
1653s um exploring the world and doing
1655s Gathering and it means a whole lot to me
1657s that that it looks good that it feels
1659s good and Roots me in the world right
1660s when players spend hundreds or thousands
1662s of hours exploring around and you know
1665s each time they interact with these
1666s things over and over again they just you
1668s know disappear or
1670s um you know there's there's not the
1671s level of touch that we're trying to put
1673s on here
1674s um it doesn't feel quite right so the
1676s fact that everyone kind of rallied
1678s together to to offer something like this
1680s like absolutely but it just makes me
1682s super excited to play the game I want to
1685s play the game I know we all want to play
1687s the game let us in Stephen
1691s you guys are the guts of it come on now
1695s um okay
1696s there is one other
1698s um one other thing I want to talk about
1700s is
1701s um also how you guys feel about the
1704s interaction of surveying with revealing
1708s resources within the world and without
1710s that element
1711s for example what we showed you today
1714s with mining you may not know what you're
1718s gonna get until you complete that
1719s harvesting action
1721s um how are you guys feeling about that
1723s we think that it creates an interesting
1726s dynamic between utilizing resources
1729s necessary to initiate that surveying
1731s sequence
1733s and what it represents for players as
1736s they choose to spend their time and or
1738s uh the meaningful choice they might make
1741s in moving to a particular area based on
1745s what resources are available in that
1746s location and discovering that through
1748s the surveying system
1750s that's another point of feedback that we
1752s want to collect uh from you guys so with
1755s that being said
1756s um are there anything else that you guys
1758s want to chat about before we close off
1761s I think we covered it all just uh thanks
1764s for including me in the chat appreciate
1766s it thank you can't wait to hear
1767s everyone's feedback super super excited
1769s it's gonna yeah this was fun this was
1771s lots of fun thank you for advice
1773s absolutely I think it's going to be a
1774s lot of fun to watch players interact
1776s with the new Gathering systems
1778s um as people get to
1780s um you know see how surveying and Land
1782s Management
1783s um accompany a player actions within the
1785s world so with that being said guys we
1787s did want to give you this update on
1789s where Gathering has come to now both
1791s from a visual bar as well as give a
1793s little bit of insight to the new systems
1795s like surveying and Land Management and
1798s we want you to chew on that we want you
1800s to think about that and give us your
1801s feedback uh both in the YouTube video on
1805s Twitch honor Forums on Discord all the
1807s places
1808s we of course appreciate that and it is a
1811s very important step
1813s um in in bringing you guys Alpha 2 and
1815s ultimately ashes of creation so with
1817s that being said Thank you guys hope you
1819s enjoyed and we will see you back on
1822s stream
1823s bye-bye bye
1827s [Music]