Features for Tournaments

(CyberDrac) #1

I don’t know if Splash Damage are aiming Quake Wars: Enemy Territory at the e-sports market, and I don’t know if they have already incorporated any tournament related features, but they may want to consider a few things.

At recent events (Multiplay i-series LAN parties) they have had a superb arrangement of commentators, streamed out over the Internet and to a large audience in a custom built arena. However I noticed that the commentators were hampered in their efforts by the lack of some features in even the most popular of games.

For example, having to join a team and then suicide in order to access spectator mode (whilst amusing to watch a commentator playing catch the grenade, missing and severely damaging the commander of one team) is not the way to run a proper e-sports commentary.

The inability to control camera clipping whilst ‘flying’ a camera means that the commentator sometime flew within a wall and lost sight of the action.

The lack of an overview to see the ebb and flow of a battle and where the front line, if any, exists. Either as a map with markers a la Counter Strike: Source, and/or as a list of objectives.

The lack of labelling of players so that in an intense firefight you are losing track of who’s playing where, very important to an e-sports commentator trying to provide his audience with a quality service, and indeed to whomever is watching who don’t know the teams in detail.

The ability for a wide audience to tune in and watch a match, not necessarily with a commentator, although that would be nice, like you can do with the TV type mods and add-ons for UT2004 and CS:S should be considered essential.

Having Teams ‘ready-up’ for a match is a very basic feature and hopefully present, but not something which is automatically present in recent releases. In game admin is essential, the ability to communicate with all players, publicly and privately is likely to be required for a successful tournament.

I love watching the pro-teams duelling it out, but e-sports is still in it’s infancy, but until the game engines start including features to make e-sports as accessible as mainstream sports then it will whither and fail.

This of course all relies on a desire for e-sports to be successful and for their product to lead the way in that field.

I apologise if this has been discussed, but with several forum searches under my belt I could find anything similar.

Best Regards and let the debate ensue.

CyberDrac

(kamikazee) #2

Honestly, try W:ET combined with ETTV and ETPro and you’ll be amazed. Allmost anything is there. (W:ET came with OSP features, which was nice!)

I think that the only things missing are the overview and spectator clipping features. The lacking overview stuff can be added in a mod, and the fact that spectators hit walls is to stop them from going outside the map. They can fly trough objectives though.

And as for ET:QW: the “TV” mode is included in the engine itself, if I’m not mistaken.

(CyberDrac) #3

Excellent, at least it looks like they are starting in the right direction, it would be a shame for a game which has got such potential as a LAN Party and Online Tournament candidate to be sidelined because it lacks the features to make it accessible and usable by commentators and spectators alike.

CD

(einer) #4

I hope they are at full power :stroggbanana: . If they make a good game, the e-sports community will take ET:QW, but it is not about the spectator features, its all about the gameplay, shooting, movement…

Maibe it will be hard to make lan games (24 players). CS, Quake and also UT can dominate these i think (easier to get 5vs5, 4vs4, 1vs1).

(CyberDrac) #5

I hope they are at full power :stroggbanana: . If they make a good game, the e-sports community will take ET:QW, but it is not about the spectator features, its all about the gameplay, shooting, movement…

Maibe it will be hard to make lan games (24 players). CS, Quake and also UT can dominate these i think (easier to get 5vs5, 4vs4, 1vs1).[/quote]

e-Sports as I see it is presenting a competitive match to an audience, if e-sports wishes to attain the same profile as more traditional sports then they need the fan base, if you can’t bring the game to the fan base in a professional, well presented manner in the style of traditional TV sports then you have no e-sports.

I agree that if the superb gameplay grabs a playing fanbase this would be a great start, and as such it may become a favourite both online and at LAN parties, but even prize winning tournaments aren’t e-sports. Once you take that next step and start taking those matches to a wider, not necessarily game playing, audience and packaging it for their benefit THEN you have e-Sports in it’s true form. In order to maximised it’s potential you need the tools to do this, and this is what this thread is, at it’s essence, about.

CD

(Nail) #6

I don’t really see that as a priority for a game, a nice addition though. it’s kinda like the clannies asking for it to be set up for 4v4 and 5v5

CPL is making their own game, also on an id Software engine

DALLAS, TX – December 17, 2006 – The Cyberathlete Professional League® (CPL), the world’s most recognized brand in professional videogame tournaments, today announced the creation of project “Severity,” a new multiplayer game developed for both PC and console systems.

Severity is a multiplayer first person shooter (FPS) focusing on team-versus-team and one-versus-one play modes. Additionally, the game offers unprecedented support for gamers worldwide playing in online and live competitions both casually and professionally.

“Severity will be the first videogame conceived from the ground up to ensure the growth and appeal of multiplayer game competitions worldwide,” said Tom Mustaine, Director of Game Development at the CPL’s new studio.

Severity is built on technology created by developer id Software™ and includes enhanced tournament support, spectator modes, as well as detailed player and tournament statistics tracking. By leveraging the enthusiastic community and practical experiences of the CPL, Severity is uniquely positioned to set new standards while raising the bar for competitive multiplayer games.

I personally like non clan playing and I don’t have the time to play in or watch tournements so those things are irrelevant to me and possibly lots of others, nice if it’s there, but hardly neccessary

(einer) #7

Your right, they are Tupper Partys.

(CyberDrac) #8

Fair enough, and I can see why these features are of no interest to you, but I would love to see e-Sports achieve it’s true potential, and I would love QW:ET to be at the heart of moving it forward.

Glad also to see CPL taking the approach that they are, but is makes sense since they are in the e-Sports business, but somehow I think that QW:ET will far exceed anything that they produce.

CD

(SniperSteve) #9

I would love to watch my favoriate ET:QW team pwn some nubs in a match on my tv.

(CyberDrac) #10

Your right, they are Tupper Partys.[/quote]

Sometimes they do have that feel to them, but it’s like Sunday league football, 22 people on the field and probably as half as many again watching, most of them players from other teams who have just finished their matches or relatives. What e-Sports has the potential to be is the online equivalent of Match of the Day or some of the big Boxing Match coverage.

CD

(senator) #11

But that depends more on the game itself than on the way you can spectate it. One of the most succesful e-sport games is Starcraft, in South Korea it’s played on a big sceen live infront of a huge audience… without any in-game spectator support at all.

With the tools available today you are alread able to create stunning videos, as well as live streaming. So I’d rather see the developers concentrate on the actual gameplay itself rather than on adding gimmics, spectator features can always be added later on in a patch or mod :slight_smile:

(einer) #12

Exactly senator.

(CyberDrac) #13

Fair enough, but I sat it a marquee with several hundred other people a few months ago watching a variety of finals, CS:S, BF2, BF2142, Q4, NFS:C these were being commentated upon by several first class shoutcasters, mixed in with live footage, in game footage and being broadcast over the web and to several large screens with the marquee itself. The quality of the end result varied dramatically depending on the game engine and the commentator’s ability to follow the game due to the tools available to them.

I agree wholeheartedly that this isn’t the highest priority for the developers, but in the long run it will shape QW:ET’s longevity, by all means add it as a patch, as a mod, whatever, all this thread was intended to do was to ask the question, have these features been considered, are they worthy of consideration.

CD

(iwound) #14

How would they all fit on top of your 14" B/W portable, are they tiny people. :huh:

(Sauron|EFG) #15

It would be really surprising if ETQW doesn’t have a spectator mode like ET; watching someone play is a great way to learn the basics. Competition specific features will no doubt be added by modders if missing from the game. A TV mod would also be nice if the game is suitable for competition.

I don’t think e-sports will attract a “non game playing” audience any time soon though, since games are harder to relate to than “real” sports (which at least all follow the same laws of physics) and have a shorter life span.

(zig-zag) #16

Splash Damage used to play in competition themselves, they talked about it in their modding conference they did at Qcon. They know exactly what competitive clans need I think. One of the reasons for the delay was for team balance, to insured equal playing field for comp. All the features are available in W:ET so they will certainly be included in QW.

(CyberDrac) #17

I agree, e-Sports will not attract a non-gaming fanbase any time soon, it will be something to work towards, and it will be hard work. Having the ability to present a match in a format that feels natural to your average non-gamer TV watching sports fan, will start to close that gap.

I believe that QW:ET will in the future provide some enthralling matches to watch, and I look forward to being able to enjoy watching them and I hope that the tools exist, either modded or part of the game, to make it the best experience possible.

The life span issue is a problem, but, for example, a FPS is a FPS, the rules change, different play modes come and go, but the genre remains through it’s many re-incarnations if different games. I hope that QW:ET grabs it’s share of the glory for the next few years.

CD

(CyberDrac) #18

Excellent News.

CD

(Rahabib) #19

Where are you now, in terms of development?
We’re approaching beta for the game and have it in closed beta testing - this is for feedback, rather than bug-testing.

We also have 8 production testers on high spec machines who are all clan players and have ex-pros, experts in the likes of Tribes and Battlefield. They give us feedback on the finest issues, such as whether a window is too high, or if cover is placed correctly in a level. In other words, we’re fine-tuning the gameplay to the high standards we set ourselves now.

source:
http://www.gamerzines.com/pcgzine/issue-2/enemey-territory---quake-wars-interview.html

I don’t think you have to worry too much.

(sledGe) #20

They have experts in Tribes and Battlefield :expressionless: Why no experts in ET :?:

… experts in Battlefield, lol. All they gonna complain about is the accurate aiming and that it should be more random! :x