Can we start making the transition into a newer, better project?

[clairebun]

This is going to be a controversial topic, so let me start off by saying I've always liked SRB2 as a game, I think it's been great and I'm always impressed with the stuff that people come out with for it. But at the same, I have too much respect for the developers (both for the main game and for modding) not to wonder why we're still wasting our time with this shit.

SRB2 is basically dead, and as time goes on it's just going to rot. It's noncommercial, it attracts the Sonic fanbase (not a good thing), it's an absurd timesink to maintain this hideously outdated engine, and there's been newer games that grant the same level of customization as SRB2 and do it way better. Most of the awesome new things we're seeing out of the community are patches to the engine that allow it to do things that other 3D games have been doing for decades. I see something like SRB2 Top Down and anything that Red makes, and the part of me that doesn't say "This is really awesome" is saying "You should really just be making your own game".

I think the combined efforts of this community is absolutely capable of coming out with a new project on a brand new engine and making actual money off of it. And it could even just be a spiritual successor to SRB2 with new characters and assets, or it could be completely new! I just want to see you guys making something great and actually being rewarded for your efforts.

 

[Monster Iestyn]

...Yeah, this is a hard topic to respond to. It's no secret SRB2's community hasn't been lively for a long time, and since 2.1's release much of the editing scene relies on Lua scripting to live now. A number of people these days seem to be more interested in the latest Nintendo releases (read: Smash, Splatoon, Mario Maker) than in SRB2, especially on IRC. Heck, no one but me even maintains the SRB2 Wiki anymore for the most part. =( Even had my own thoughts of bailing out of the community recently, yes it's THAT bad.

...However, I don't think of being non-commercial as a bad thing necessarily. Being one of the devs for SRB2 itself, I never personally cared about not making money from developing the game - I just liked helping to make a good game that people like! I'm sure this must be the same feeling for a few others (right?). If anything, being non-profit has probably been part of what kept people coming to SRB2 all these years, apart from being a Sonic fangame, a customizable game, and everything else (and actually being a game as opposed to a failed attempt to perfect Sonic physics in a 3D engine).

That said, re-inventing SRB2's community (and most certainly SRB2's existing development team in its entirety) as one for an entirely new game that we can make our money from... I feel that would be extremely difficult at this point. I see it more likely that we at the SRB2 Dev team would eventually go our separate ways, possibly making new games of our own if we wanted to do so, perhaps creating new communities of our own from scratch if possible. In fact some from the SRB2 community have already left to do such things over the years, if my memory is correct.

(These are just my immediate thoughts on the subject really, I could probably come up with something more substantial later perhaps. =V )

 

[Ritz]

Wait, what? We just got polyobject flats and slopes and now you guys are trying to tell me the game is dead? I've never been more excited about this game. Contests have been getting some strong results. I think everything's going to be okay.

That said, totally ready for the RPP exodus.

EDIT: Okay Mystic saw the thread and it's not locked yet so I've got time to flesh this out: I'm not usually one to discourage fangamers from developing original content, but I don't have any confidence in this community's ability to produce a commercial product. No offense, I know what ancient engines with shitty codebases can do for morale and I admire everyone's resilience in maintaining it for so long, but you guys still could've finished this game years ago. It could be finished in a year right now, but you just keep tweaking the same old content. You guys suck at management (can't argue with the results, though). Also I think RPP is proof enough that the brand is critical to the game's success, and wherever you go from here, the scene isn't going to follow you. You've got a good thing going with Sonic, keep at it.

 

[Rob]

I've always liked SRB2 as a game

You've already answered your own question.

We're not here to develop the bestest game ever. We're also not here to develop a game engine. We're making a fun, entertaining, quality game. And we're working on it because we love the game and want to see it through to completion, making it as fun as possible. This is a labor of love, not a labor of profits. Every other point you made does not actually address the purpose behind the development of the game.

Though I do want to address the point you made about SRB2 rotting. I'm not sure how you come to this conclusion. The base engine is aged, sure. But the game itself has evolved to break the most problematic limitations that it had. At this point, the idea is to make a game that has a solid classic feel to it. I think we accomplish this very well. I've never felt like I'm playing a game that aged poorly (like Sonic Adventure) when playing SRB2.

 

[Ritz]

We're not here to develop the bestest game ever.

...making it as fun as possible.

So how committed are you to Maximizing Fun? Because there's a whole laundry list of nontrivial additions we could gain from a new engine that would make the game exponentially more fun: Slope physics, wall running, full rotational camera control, 3D rendering, animated stage geometry, functional netcode- any two of these would more than justify a conversion.

Barely any sense in pushing for it 17 years later, but when RPP is right there just flaunting all this shit? Little surprised no one is even curious. By all means finish SRB2, but I'd love for people to start exploring other projects. There's got to be some threshold where the completion of a game we've all put 500 hours into just isn't so tantalizing anymore.

 

[76Nova]

Before you read this keep in mind, this is coming from someone with absolutely no coding knowledge or game development experience whatsoever.

That said, I feel like if SRB2 was forgotten for a newer better project, it wouldn't be the same. when playing SRB2 I get the sense that effort was put into the creation of the game because the devs simply wanted to do it, and nkt because they get paid for it. Whatever game came out of that, probably wouldn't have the same charm as SRB2 does right now IMO.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but don't you guys make this game because you like it and you want to?

 

[Ritz]

Yeah, your point? Nobody's going to get paid for SRB2, Cobalt's talking about starting something else entirely.

What he's really getting at is that we're all in our 20s or later and are (or should be) looking for ways to apply these skills we've acquired to something that will actually yield a return on investment beyond "this is rly cool" comments on a Sonic forum. Everyone balks when people start talking about money in a modding community, but this is a training ground, it's not meant to last.

 

[76Nova]

Yeah, your point? Nobody's going to get paid for SRB2, Cobalt's talking about starting something else entirely.

What he's really getting at is that we're all in our 20s or later and are (or should be) looking for ways to apply these skills we've acquired to something that will actually yield a return on investment beyond "this is rly cool" comments on a Sonic forum. Everyone balks when people start talking about money in a modding community, but this is a training ground, it's not meant to last.

I totally get what you're saying. I was just stating how I felt about it.

Maybe SRB2 can become a community based thing, or maybe a side thing that can be kept going.

 

[Rob]

You're working under the assumption that everyone on the dev team would want to start another project.

I can only speak for myself on this one, but I fell in love with SRB2. I didn't fall in love with game design. I am actively working towards studying physics and astronomy. I have no desire to pursue a career or job in game development or stage design. I have no qualms with people moving on from SRB2 to bigger and better things (they're definitely out there), but I don't consider SRB2 to be anything like a lost cause.

So how committed are you to Maximizing Fun? Because there's a whole laundry list of nontrivial additions we could gain from a new engine that would make the game exponentially more fun: Slope physics, wall running, full rotational camera control, 3D rendering, animated stage geometry, functional netcode- any two of these would more than justify a conversion.

I'm not convinced that all of these are necessary for our game. I love the new slopes, don't get me wrong. Including them in the game has done nothing but good for it. But I'm still not sold that they were ever, strictly speaking, a necessary inclusion. We had a fun and dynamic game without them. And we have a fun dynamic game without all the above listed (maybe sans netcode).

Also what's important to note here, every dev member is a volunteer. Nobody is forced at all to work on this game, nobody is required to stick with it. If people want to part with the team or split off and make their own projects, that's something they're welcome to do.

 

[fickleheart]

I feel obligated to say something since I'm mentioned in the first post.

Who says a person can only work on one project at a time? I've tried to work on plenty of original concepts on my own when I don't feel like working on SRB2. (Granted, none of them ever got anywhere, but...) I can also say there are plenty of other people in the community who are working on other projects that I've either heard of or have been asked to help with. It's not as if working on SRB2 or any other project(s) are mutually exclusive things, assuming one manages their time well.

That said, although I'm not speaking for anyone else here, I enjoy working on SRB2 just for the sake of working on it. Seeing the results of something like slopes implemented in-engine is cool and all, but really I just find a sense of joy out of digging into the crusty, patch-job engine, figuring out what every little unmarked bottomfrac = (centeryfrac>>4) - FixedMul (worldbottom, rw_scale); does, and prodding things until something cool happens. The software renderer is cool, man. Working in OpenGL is almost sleep-inducing in comparison. It's kind of like homebrew developers charging into uncharted territory to see what they can make a console do with nothing but the notes of others who are doing the same. (Coincidentally, guess what else I'm working on at present lol) I'm well aware that the work I've put into this game isn't going to pay out or anything, but if I'm having fun doing it and it's not getting in the way of more important things, why stop?

 

[chaoloveicemdboy]

It would be nice to add some more extra features to increase the replay value of SRB2. People are bored of SRB2, because it needs more features in my opinion. Even if you did fix the netcode and didn't add anymore extra features that increased the replay value, people would still be bored of SRB2.

 

[Ritz]

I'm not convinced that all of these are necessary for our game.

They're not necessary! The whole game isn't necessary. Fun is optional. Not the most compelling stance when the depth we'd gain from those features is equivalent to the jump from grayscale to color. It's really hard to exaggerate a 20 year technological gap, that time wasn't put to waste.

I already said as much, we've got so many game changing features on the table right now that nobody's even taken advantage of yet- this thread was the furthest thing from my mind. But it's still sad how quick you guys are to justify your holding pattern. Last November, people were talking at me on IRC as if slopes were a BAD idea.

 

[clairebun]

Wait, what? We just got polyobject flats and slopes and now you guys are trying to tell me the game is dead? I've never been more excited about this game. Contests have been getting some strong results. I think everything's going to be okay.

The part that bothers me is that we're in 2015, and to us it's a triumph to render moving floors and slopes when this was a given in any other 3D game. The poor foundation of this entire project has been holding us back for the last decade -- even if it's not so much "dead" thanks to us finally getting what we should have had for years, the game is still struggling to stay relevant, especially outside of our shrinking community.

EDIT: Okay Mystic saw the thread and it's not locked yet so I've got time to flesh this out: I'm not usually one to discourage fangamers from developing original content, but I don't have any confidence in this community's ability to produce a commercial product. No offense, I know what ancient engines with shitty codebases can do for morale and I admire everyone's resilience in maintaining it for so long, but you guys still could've finished this game years ago. It could be finished in a year right now, but you just keep tweaking the same old content. You guys suck at management (can't argue with the results, though). Also I think RPP is proof enough that the brand is critical to the game's success, and wherever you go from here, the scene isn't going to follow you. You've got a good thing going with Sonic, keep at it.

Not saying we should build Rome, but at the very least I think the community should consider side projects to generate interest and growth. And I won't argue that the brand name doesn't draw attention, but what about going the Freedom Planet route? A product that looks like a Sonic game certainly should be able to find a market even if the characters are different.

 

[Zubat]

I've only been playing this for two years. Maybe three; it was around the time 2.0.7 was released. I remember having to update from 2.0.6 a month into playing it. I dont know much about SRB2's history, but I did actively play Doom long before I ever tried this game.

What the devs have done with this engine is remarkable. Sure they could have switched from Doom Legacy to Chocolate Doom, or even ZDoom, at any time. It would have made some things commonplace a lot sooner (like slopes). But these people are so diligent and skilled. I love seeing small communities like this make breakthroughs with old games. I actively keep up with the classic Spyro scene as well as Tak and Sly Cooper, and it warms my heart to see people take so much interest in one little thing. They were inspired, and, they enjoy the content they recieve and, even while leading private lives with school and work and socializing, they spend part of their time analyzing these games.

Anybody who takes art apart to understand, replicate, and even build off of it, should be respected. They're people with an amazing sense of creativity and community and passion that I can only look up to.

Everybody's stay with the community should be a positive one. People (devs included) do eventually leave for their own outside desires, but that's okay too. The age of the this project and its slow update schedule shouldn't make it invaluable. I think SRB2's very existance gives it all the worth it deserves.

 

[fickleheart]

The part that bothers me is that we're in 2015, and to us it's a triumph to render moving floors and slopes when this was a given in any other 3D game.

Again, it's like the homebrew scene: the appeal is in pushing the limits of hardware (or in our case, an engine) stuck in the past. PCs have been able to render high-color with ease for decades, but an NES tech demo that pushes past the console's stated palette limitations is still impressive as hell.

The poor foundation of this entire project has been holding us back for the last decade -- even if it's not so much "dead" thanks to us finally getting what we should have had for years, the game is still struggling to stay relevant, especially outside of our shrinking community.

I'd say we're far from being "held back" by our engine. The game's stayed relevant for a hell of a lot longer than many other 3D Sonic fangames, mostly due to the fact that, unlike most, it's seen consistent (if slow) development over the years. Most games you see are an engine test and a few okay maps if you're lucky; meanwhile, we have a game that, although incomplete, still has enough coherent content to appeal to people, and most of it (sorry about CEZ1) is pretty high-quality!

Would a game on a new engine, with SRB2's level of quality, be cool to see? Hell ye. But right now our interests lie in taking what we have and finishing our game, maybe fixing the biggest issues as we're able. We already develop content a lot slower than anyone (including ourselves) would like, so moving everything over to a new engine would take forever. And that's, of course, assuming we don't all lose interest first. Trying to switch everything over with our rate of production would basically be a death sentence.

But it's still sad how quick you guys are to justify your holding pattern. Last November, people were talking at me on IRC as if slopes were a BAD idea.

I'll be the first to admit that anyone calling slopes a bad idea was being overly pessimistic. That said, the biggest obstacle toward slopes was, as I used to say for at least the last little stretch of time before they happened, motivation. Adding slopes does benefit the game, but at the same time, not adding slopes never really harmed the game either. The community tends to assume that, since not having feature X isn't actively harming the game, adding feature X would therefore be a waste of time, which is where a lot of the old anti-slope sentiment came from. That's wrong in a lot of cases; non-vital features still usually add to the overall quality of the product. (Lua scripting support is far from required, but I sure as hell wouldn't have stuck around if it wasn't in 2.1!)

On the other hand, adding feature X requires someone (a coder, since we're talking about engine features) to sit down and add something to the game that isn't necessarily vital to finishing the project. Considering we're a volunteer project to begin with (and I'd estimate most of the people involved can contribute 5-8 hours a week at most to active development), typically such a thing will only happen if someone really wants it. (Or, as in slopes' case, has a close friend who really wants it. hi chee) And then you have to consider the additional development cost (we're talking time, not dollars) needed to polish said feature, get it up to snuff with the rest of the game's quality, and in some cases get other parts of the game up-to-date.

 

[Prime 2.0]

The game that comes included with SRB2's engine is extroardinary in many ways, but to me, the magical thing about this game is the modding scene.

Somehow, someway we've built up an institution and culture that trains people to make new content for a 17 year old game, and attracts people who are willing to undergo that training, and then retains them for years and years while a collective idea of what makes a good level or boss continues to evolve and be pushed farther than before.

A new engine means invalidating the expertise that has been built up over this long, long period. It means starting from scratch - and as Ritz pointed out, there's no guarantee of anyone crossing over for it. If the modding train ever puts on the brakes, it is unlikely to ever start moving again. If that ever happens, we will have lost something very precious.

 

[Mystic]

I think a lot of people overlook the value of our engine's limitations and what they've provided us. If we weren't restricted by our engine, we probably would have ended up with yet another pretty physics demo with simple, small stages with a billion loops and things that don't work well. Because of our limited engine, however, we had to get creative to implement the things we wanted to see, creating a unique gameplay style that would not have happened if it weren't for those engine limitations. I honestly believe our twenty year old game engine is an asset, not a hindrance.

As time goes by many of our engine's limitations have fallen. We've come a long way from when GFZ2 was hitting up against the stage size limitations. That doesn't mean that the lessons learned and the decisions made to work within those previous limitations have gone away. While we now have the ability to make slopes and horizontally moving platforms, those things aren't suddenly going to replace the game we've already made. Those features will be added onto a growing core of game mechanics that we already have.

Basically the only part of our engine that's truly holding us back is the shitty netcode. Everything else is the type of limitation that just requires a creative person to come around and make the most of it. Limitations breed creativity, and I think this project is the perfect example of that.

...you guys still could've finished this game years ago. It could be finished in a year right now, but you just keep tweaking the same old content. You guys suck at management (can't argue with the results, though).

Now THIS is something that does drive me nuts, but as time has gone on I've learned to accept why this is going to happen regardless. SRB2 is a hobbyist project at the end of the day. People work on SRB2 because they're passionate about SRB2 and want to see it become better. This means it's very hard to direct the project towards a specific goal, because individual people have different things that they're passionate about. So sure, it sounds like we could have a more complete game if we didn't keep reworking old content, but in reality you can't take the passion that was required to rework THZ and tell someone "that passion's great, but instead go make this". Passion isn't transferable. In fact, before I figured this out I once tried to do exactly what you're saying only to cause the biggest drop in productivity I've ever done, because I didn't yet realize this very important point. People don't like to be told that their pet project they're passionate about isn't productive.

So yes, we are going to very slowly plod along towards a complete game in a very indirect way. It's not a problem in management as much as it is a problem in handling a group of volunteer artists.

 

[Ritz]

All great points.

What the devs have done with this engine is remarkable. Sure they could have switched from Doom Legacy to Chocolate Doom, or even ZDoom, at any time. It would have made some things commonplace a lot sooner (like slopes). But these people are so diligent and skilled. I love seeing small communities like this make breakthroughs with old games.

Funny thing is I've seen at least one person who thinks SRB2 is Doom's cutting edge now. I don't know what the rest of the scene is like right now, but Red's done a great job of catching up with those ports' feature lists.

 

[clairebun]

sigh, alright, let me give you a personal anecdote and maybe you guys will see what I'm all about here.

This thing I was doing was all started because I wanted to play the final boss level with better-sounding music in the background. And I kept making music because I wanted to shape SRB2's sound into what I thought it should be. So trust me, I get it; passion is the driving force when it comes to getting a project done on here.

But I'll be goddamned if getting paid to reinvent the soundtrack wouldn't have made me finish it half a year ago. Fact of the matter is that I have bills to pay, and while I would like to spend some of my free time making cool sounding shit for you guys, I'm kinda busy trying to make a living, and for any of that spare time I have left, I would much rather pursue hobbies that require less brainpower. I dunno, maybe Red has a lot of spare time on his hands so this doesn't apply to him, but for anyone who's in my position or a similar one, money absolutely would be a helpful incentive to get things done.

The bottom line here isn't to reinvent the wheel or burn this project into the ground because it's copyrighted... I just want to see you guys make some money. Open a paypal or something, I don't care. Some kind of revenue incentive would skyrocket our community's prosperity.

 

[Ritz]

Another personal anecdote: Over a month ago, I started talking money with the team on the project I abandoned my wad for because half the group wasn't getting any work done, and it kicked off this massive shitfest and nobody's touched the game since. I mean, that wasn't really related- there's just this one guy who's really good at talking shit and getting everyone worked up. But it came out that we all got together because we were passionate about the concept, and people were dropping off in favor of their own projects because they'd discovered the engine just wasn't fun to work with. And now I'm here browsing SRB2MB and really thinking about finishing that wad over putting some hours into this thing that could actually net me some cash. It's been nagging at me all year. SRB2's the game that got me into creative thinking and I'm still beholden to it whenever a new feature drops.

I don't think there's a moral here. "Don't talk about money", I guess