Goals and a little thing called Beta

Well, I just read a post about some of the team aiming for a September beta. Now without being too blunt what I think about that notion, we should as a team have some goals in mind.

But firstly I want to make sure that we remember that we are to have fun with this project, rather than be all consuming for a date.

What is our definition of a Beta? In most cases its used as a platform for introducing it to the public, so that developers can receive feedback and bugs to fix. I think this is an important point; will the team be ready to have a version that we can definitively say is a version that we can fix bugs and not be introducing new ones?

Under this definition, I think the bare minimum requirements would be:

Quests finished, likely with bugs. We want to ensure that we do not go in cycles of bug-fixing with each release. We do not want to test from scratch because we introduce so many new factors. The below elements will have a major impact on that.

Models and Textures 100% replaced, unoptimized. Lets say instead we agreed that we have a goal of 50% replaced at Beta. Are we truly testing the game? Are bug reports legitimate or worth acting upon?

I personally would be far more comfortable if we are releasing anything "official", that we don't distribute the old assets anymore. We need about 600 further models replaced (excluding armor, weapons and creatures). Even if we were to receive 10 models per week we are still looking at 60 weeks. This is without any type of further work to insure quality and optimization of models and textures.

Collisions unoptimized or optimized? Unfortunately all the replacement models are using full detail meshes for collision. Creating low poly versions of collisions is a major project. Again are we truly testing the game unoptimized? We can probably rollout with more quality control if we have a dedicated member or team, but with thousands of models, I cannot stress the additional time involved.

World 100% navigation-meshed. Is the world to be navigation meshed? If so that also in theory means that landscaping should be finished as well. Otherwise we are falsely testing.

It is unrealistic to have all the interiors cluttered and thus perfectly navigation-meshed, so I wouldn't include this as fully testable on Beta. Quests might mean that specific locations need to be finalized. But we have disclaimers that bugs will occur in interiors with NPCs and Creatures.

I’d estimate that it would take 1 person exclusively about 6 months to navigation mesh the outside world. ArchieVision worked on Dragonborn underwater navigation-meshing so we can get a better estimate from him.

Installer that is robust and easy. I'll shoot myself in the head if we spend our days instructing individuals on their problems with getting the game going.

I'll point out some of the things that I think under a tight schedule would not be included; distant objects (LOD), gameplay/mechanics/balance wanted, special effects, special lighting or weather, interiors cluttered, creatures with their animations fully completed, armors, clothing and weapons will still have some placeholders. The list of course is much longer, but this just to illustrate.

You can see even if we have the bare minimum in for Beta (for a forced date), we leave out so much of the elements of the game, that we expose ourselves to major cycles of re-testing.

If we have 3 fundamental goals for the project; Release, Quality and Optimization, Features, then we can use a distribution triangle to give each a weight, so that we know as a team, where our priorities lie

Release, the weight to delivering the game as soon as possible.

Quality and Optimization, beautification and realism of landscape and interiors, models and textures and getting everything as streamlined as possible for performance and esthetic reasons.

Features, are things like the mechanics of the game. Gameplay, spells, crafting, etc. How many extra things are added like, special effects (ash/blight storms), variations in creatures/environment, special combat (underwater/spears), voice acting, additional scenes to name a few.

So if we had a game that had all the features we wanted and the quality and performance was that of a AAA game, and we gave ourselves as long as we wanted to do it, the perfect game as such, this is what the weight distribution would be;

If we are wanting to have as an early Beta release as possible, my interpretation is more like there would be few features and not much weight to quality and optimization, with the delivery of the game having the dominating factor.

I'm fine with however the group decides what sort of game we want to deliver as a Beta, but we must decide where we want to be within this distribution and what our actual definitions are for the term.

This will decide what we leave out, aim to put in, and the quality of the Beta and/or what we aim for users to test.

I cannot stress the importance of what do WE gain out of a Beta? How does it benefit the project progressively to a finished game?

Last edited by grumpycat on 27 Mar 2014 - 03:14.

I understand the not all the

I understand the not all the team will be around forever, that is why we need to plan ahead as a community project.

It is very feasible that members at the end of the year are completely different to those who are working on it now, including myself.

So it's important to outline goals for the community as a whole, and have realistic goals and contingencies for levels of contributions for the next few years.

grumpy stuff (this not

People don't know what a beta is. I think at some point the main contributors will consider their work is done. When we reach a point where we can release, we release. Follow up bug fixes, enhancement etc will happen for sure, whether it's with the same contributors or more recent ones is something that will happen organically I reckon.

grumpy stuff

(this not addressed to happychappy) <grumpy>Also, I would suggest that modders that actually contributes to the game itself (and I don't mean throwing ideas, lore details or designs - sorry I mean assets production and master content) are the ones closest to know what the real roadmap is. I will certainly not accept deadline from someone whose work I never merged in the master or saw in-game.</grumpy>

at happychappy. iam really

at happychappy. iam really interested in a roadmap or to do list. maybe i can do more as i do now.

so you're saying theres a

so you're saying theres a chance ;)

My point is that when you lay

My point is that when you lay out everything on the table, we realistically are looking at least another year just to get the minimum requirements of a Beta.

With probably another year to implement the quality, optimization and features that we decide are feasiblele to match a release date.

Digital made a good point in a previous post about Skywind is a vision of the far future. I agree, we should compile a list of tasks, milestones and goals to better understand where the project is at and how far we have to go.

I think we are more likely to see a Beta around middle of next year, with a more stable version beginning of 2016, this is Beta not a release either. So if we want to kick around a date loosely we need to be thinking 2016. A bit of a shock for some, but as I said we won't all be around for that length of time, so its about laying the platform and road maps so that the project can continue with changing of guards.

HappyChappy I really agree

HappyChappy I really agree with your point of view, one of the things we have learned from modding communities, programming in general etc etc is that open projects always see the light of day, more than their counterparts. Many of the modders probably won't be around the whole time, some may get tired and just quit, some will eventually have to face their real lives and like it was already mentioned some will just think release date is freedom day, when it is not even close. The best thing would be to lay the whole project down, set milestones, set goals, review milestones, review goals which takes a lot of effort.

IMO Sep. 2014 is very close, yes it can be done, but is it worth it? I don't thing rushing into it would help in any way the project. In fact I think it would damage it.

As much as I want this, as a player, as a fan, as a supporter, I think a lot of goals and decisions should be made. I see most are already aware of it. In preparing for a beta release there are all these questions popping out. Should we optimize the whole thing? Should we add the minuscule features that probably most of the people won't even care for? Should we test every little thing? And the list goes on.

When all of these things are laid out, when all of these questions are answered then there may be a real estimate for the release date and an honest answer about the future of the project.

Like a painting, a project starts with great passion, the first lines are the very best, the shapes make your mouth water and soon like every painter, you see yourself with this amazing contour, sketch, and think to yourself " how the hell am I going to colour all this? " and this is when a lot of people, painters, musicians give up, get depressed and recycle the idea. I think you are on a great path, some of the video presentations are awe-inspiring, you have got a great thing going on. It just needs that finalization, that courage to get it over with. And as soon as you start colouring, its beauty starts showing.

Boy, it had been a while since I last wrote a comment this long, especially in English, but I just couldn't stand there, I wanted to express my opinion on the matter, I wanted to congratulate everyone of you on the work you are putting into this, I for one, surely know how life can stop people from achieving their goals and most important of all, I know how 'we' can stop ourselves from reaching them. I also wanted to express the gratitude for something like this being done, for many of us Morrowind was one of those games we grew up with and it has not aged well, although the modding community is great you can see the limits of the engine.

So thank you for all your work and dedication, congratulations on everything you have done so far and hopefully after reviewing the state of the project, setting the milestones, everything will be better.

Quests finished, likely with

Quests finished, likely with bugs. We want to ensure that we do not go in cycles of bug-fixing with each release. We do not want to test from scratch because we introduce so many new factors. The below elements will have a major impact on that.

As a software developer, I feel inclined to point out that following this attitude blindly is a bad idea, and is how code becomes unmanageable. If you are going to subscribe to a code-first-debug-later philosophy, make sure to keep track of the bugs very thoroughly. I realize that the task of creating quests is more linear than designing a software system, but leaving the debugging to the end has damned many a software project.

I have discussed a few of

I have discussed a few of these ideas with assorted people, but I will lay them out for general consideration.

1. Form teams of the new artists and give them goals to achieve. Maybe we get a good 3ds max guy and a good zbrush guy that come in together. Why not pair them up and maybe a good photoshop guy and tech artist to boot. That would make them pretty self-sufficient. Giving the team timed goals would also help with accountability. It is to our benefit to work together, learn from each other, and have fun together.

2. Plan on releasing a beta of a small region first, with partial quests and whatever models we have finalized. Getting something polished to the public will bring in a LOT of modding talent at once. Then we refer to step one, and set them loose. This way, our Devs can keep working and not have to cattle herd. The keepers will stay and we can re-arrange teams as people leave.

3. Have an organized chart to show progress on a week by week basis. Just as Happy made a timeline for the models based on rate, I think having a weekly, "we completed this, we have this percentage left to go, and at this rate we can finish at this date" chart will motivate the more slackerly members to get a little more hustle going, and give us all a better idea of how we are doing as a community mod.

Rather than having Beta so

Rather than having Beta so soon, why not an open Alpha, with a new iteration say every month or so, until the goals to begin a Beta are reached? I think it would be a great way to show the progress being made to the community as it's made, not to mention it could potentially draw more people into helping with the project. Though I doubt anyone cares about my opinion.

Also: I'm with Ashking on the teams thing.

I'd rather not have a public

I'd rather not have a public alpha, I mean that was basically what we used to do. I feel that every week were are trying to become more "professional", which is generally a good thing, so to keep up with (I'm not really sure what to call it) gaming industry standards, a public beta before the end of the year is quite plausible. A lot of work has been done even since the start of the year and if we times the effort put in by 1.2-1.5 we could comfortably aim for an end of year beta - maybe when they have holidays? When that time comes, we will need to have a special beta page so that people can report bugs with ease without making their own thread.

I don't want to sounds

I don't want to sounds negative, I'm just being realistic, but unless something drastically changes with development, we do not even know if we will reach a Beta. Its a big assumption.

Can people not pluck unrealistic dates out of the air, its detrimental to the project.

If we continue at the rate of development we will not have a Beta until at least a year, probably more like a year and a half. A reminder that is only 365-548 days. What has to be developed in that number of days, does not compute with all the elements that have to be done.

Unless you can show me timelines of tasks and progress, to the contrary.

I've written software development specifications and estimates, trust me I know how projects string together. You can just about double estimates if you want realistic deliveries.

The next time I see anybody think that we can deliver anything this year will incur my wrath.

Skywind is packed and

Skywind is packed and complete and ready to be sold at your local Wallmart starting tomorrow.

Didn't seem to fly over too

Didn't seem to fly over too well in chat, but thought I'd just toss it out there that instead of waiting until we're at the true Beta stage here in 12 years, and instead of putting out a half-finished public alpha, we might be able to focus our efforts on one area for the time being to make a fully polished (limited) demo.

A place like Balmora does not seem that unrealistic. Fairly easy layout, simplistic architecture (by Morrowind standards) that is already being worked on, and it's the most iconic town in the game - full of characters that everyone will remember. A demo that just focuses on this town wouldn't have any real quests, but we could make sure the interiors and exteriors look complete, and we should be able to have the characters fully voiced for a glimpse at what the end game could feel like. This might help draw in more developers to the project.

However long you think it would take to finish Balmora doesn't matter. Set a calendar date or don't set one. If we have the navmeshers modelers, clutterers and voicerers all working on it it will get done, and by definition it will take much much less time than it will take to get the entire island into a 'beta' state. We will be left with a refined product to show off.

OK, how about this for an

OK, how about this for an idea? We are looking at making closed world spaces anyway.

So new worldspace, Balmora.

We make a completed Balmora, with every model and texture 100% replaced.

Call it "Tesrenewal: Balmora", release that fucker on Bethesda and Nexus forums and get a wider audience of modders. Challenges authority because its a project in theory that adheres to EULA. Let me do my tricky wording to insure that any talk of "porting" assets or even Skywind for that matter is not mentioned on the forums (or moderators will be asked to delete the posts, blah, blah). Modders can be signing up for the next project "Tesrenewal: Vivec" or whatever?

I have to admit the scope of the project is starting to depress me a bit, so something like this with a set goal kind of gives me some hope.

You know what? You're

You know what? You're absolutely right. It might sound harsh but it's the perspective everyone needs. The question is, where do we go from now? I don't want to be like Beyond Skyrim which release only part of a province in each release. We need to get things sorted, but I'm not too sure how yet. Any ideas that we can realistically put into action?

HappyChappy wrote:

HappyChappy
Call it "Tesrenewal: Balmora", release that fucker on Bethesda and Nexus forums and get a wider audience of modders.

Oh my, no :(

As an outside observer, if we

As an outside observer, if we can all just get over that, legal issues notwithstanding the more closed the whole project is, the more it's probably going to hurt it. Yes, we all feel sullen not being able to play it.

BUT, my main advice is just to ignore everything and love the art you're making. Nothing else should matter. So far it's not really that Morrowind's being ported that's got people's jaws dropping--it's the artistic talent and faithfulness that's gone into recreating it. If you guys feel, spontaneously, that a release is warranted, do it. But don't overthink anything that isn't actual content. So far the main content creators have done this as a labor of love, not a labor of fill-in-the blank. Yes, you're a public forum and random people are going to get excited and shitpost, but generally take that as a sign that people are shitting their pants at the quality and talent behind this. Don't get bogged down overthinking the meta-bullshit.

Just look at Tamriel Rebuilt to see what I mean.

Nothing really, resign

Any ideas that we can realistically put into action?

Nothing really, resign ourselves to the long haul, buckle down and do some work. Try and recruit as best as possible, but chances are we bob our heads back up in years time and then we can start talking about some sort of beta release, that's if the project still has solid developers working on it. Otherwise it was a good ride while it lasted.

I dont know about everyone

I dont know about everyone else, but I am here for the long haul now. So even if I have to learn modelling, texturing, animating, landscaping, cluttering, etc. I will see this project to release

I know this post will most

I know this post will most likely anger some, amuse others, and raise questions, but anyway ...

My experience with modding snd modders over the past few years tells me that no mod is ever 'finished'. All mods are "released" as 'beta' and their status never changes. I suppose this is to allow the modder to say "It's just a Beta" when people report serious bugs and omissions that should have been found and fixed before the mod was ever put out to the public. Even Bethesda rushes to put a buggy game out to the public.

Modding for oblivion or skyrim is a long, slow process if you do it right. There are a few modders who are good enough to actually do things right, but some are just programmer wannabes who don't have the patience to actually test things before declaring "Beta". Their mods are thrown together and usually don't perform well, mess things up, and step all over everyone else in their rush to get their mod out into the world.

They want 'bugs' reported that includes the fix for the issue so they just need to copy it into their 'next release' of Beta.

Bugs happen and they should be reported. But I've seen way too many modders put out garbage and then whine when someone calls them on it. Please don't do that here.

There's been a lot of lofty ideas expressed here. Be careful. Most things designed by committee end up being scrapped because too many bad ideas were included.

This mod has the potential to be a good one. Don't rush it.

[External image]

I'll consider it a "beta"

I'll consider it a "beta" when everyone has clothes on and I don't have to keep hearing my wife asking me why I keep playing this. I can almost live with the purple walls and dropping through the floor every couple of feet in the mines.

Okay, back to scrubbing quests...

I have been watching all the

I have been watching all the contributors on this site for a long time now, the work on here(recreated in-game models, updated landscaping, voice acting, and everything else) collectively will make Skywind, without doubt, the greatest mod released in recent history, there is real talent and creativity being made here. It would be a shame if it was tarnished by a heap ton of bugs and other issues. I say not to rush it no matter how long it takes, there are literally hundreds of thousands of fans waiting for this project to be complete, and the fans will definitely wait for it just to see it come to full realization.

Well, I could be wrong, but I

Well, I could be wrong, but I'd say Falskaar is finished.

AJV wrote on his facebook

AJV wrote on his facebook page yesterday that he is still working on a bug fix/update. But yes, it's mostly finished.

Falskaar only used a polished

Falskaar only used a polished new world and no new models (nothing fancy at least) . You seriously want to Compare the two projects?

Would it be out of the

Would it be out of the question for the installer to come packaged with the latest version of skse, as it does greatly improve the stability of the game as a whole.

thedarkprince wrote:

thedarkprince
Falskaar only used a polished new world and no new models (nothing fancy at least) . You seriously want to Compare the two projects?

It was never specified whether new assets or vanilla assets would be used in the analogy that no mod of this size is ever fully completed. Back to the main topic, please.

mxzero11 wrote:

mxzero11
Would it be out of the question for the installer to come packaged with the latest version of skse, as it does greatly improve the stability of the game as a whole.

I don't think the license for skse would allow that (but I didn't check).

Y'all should open up a

Y'all should open up a donation page >.>

I'd gladly pay the price of a video game to play morrowind via the skyrim engine.

<.<

we're not allowed.

NathanielRHamrick wrote:

NathanielRHamrick
Y'all should open up a donation page >.>

I'd gladly pay the price of a video game to play morrowind via the skyrim engine.

<.<

Check this thread out for more information: https://tesrenewal.com/forums/skyrim/skywind-development/3411

Hey Grumpy, one thing that

Hey Grumpy, one thing that could help the SFX team - maybe Taj is already taking care of this, if so sorry for stepping on your toes Mistah T - is knowing what SFX if any are required for certain deadlines. Right now we're working kind of free-form, which is fine for me personally, but we're nowhere near alpha audio-wise - we still have a lot of creatures to do, let alone magic and interactive objects. So if there are any specific deadlines you need us to hit, please let us know :)

^Totally agree. Music has

^Totally agree. Music has been great at organizing itself and expanding but SFX has a lot to cover and could absolutely benefit from an addition to this page.