Rand's visit and news for Age Creators

[I.Brattin]

BTW I don't expect Cyan to Open Source Uru. Release Tools, sure. Open Source it, no. The reason being is their deal with Creative Kingdoms. While Maqiquest is running Plasma 3.0 their still running Plasma, there will be differences between 2.1 and 3.0 but a lot will stay the same. If we had the code we could figure out how to hack Magiquest. And I seriously think that Creative Kingdoms knows that and are likely squashing any attempts Cyan makes of Open Sourcing Uru.

[Aloys]

That's a possibility but that's hard to say for sure. It depends on the agreements they have with Magiquest. I'm pretty sure Cyan retains all the rights regarding the technology, but CK would probably be able to pressure them if they wanted to.

At any rate I'm pretty sure nobody would need OS Uru at all to 'hack' Magiquest in various ways.. What is already known of the various Uru Plasmas, is more than enough.

[JWPlatt]

I seriously think that Creative Kingdoms knows that and are likely squashing any attempts Cyan makes of Open Sourcing Uru.

Categorically no. The MQO code has branched pretty far from MOUL already and that will only continue. Just for one example, an avatar can trigger an effect in a straight line to a remote object. The MOUL code requires a specific position. There are a significant number of other server and client differences.

Would not that create a conflict with Open Source Uru vs the MQ commercial game

No.

About MQO and Open Uru:

Let's put the speculation to rest. I can officially say that the open source question is not tied to the MagiQuest Online development agreement with Cyan Worlds. Creative Kingdoms/MagiQuest Online is not putting any conditions on Open Uru. Cyan's open source plans are their own.

http://mystonline.com/forums/viewtopic. ... 744#307744

http://mystonline.com/forums/viewtopic. ... 502#310502

In response to my post, semplerfi requested something more official and got it.

I would like Cyan to speak for it self. Post something as simple and non-committal as:

Cyan’s business agreement with Creative Kingdoms/MagiQuest Online does not affect Cyan’s open source plans. Cyan is busy working on other things and will get to open source as resources become available.

This isn't news, since the second half is pretty much what Rand said at Mysterium. But I'll reiterate:

Cyan's business agreement with Creative Kingdoms/MagiQuest Online does not affect Cyan's open source plans.Cyan is busy working on other things and will get to open source as resources become available.

http://mystonline.com/forums/viewtopic. ... 835#307835

If there's one thing working on this side of things has taught me, it's to be more aware of what really is speculation and what isn't. (And who's the best at it, and who isn't. )

You folks should read the MOUL forums more often.

[Aloys]

Thanks for the clarification JWPlatt.

[Chacal]

You folks should read the MOUL forums more often.

Why? In the rare cases when something relevant is posted there, it will be reported here by someone without all the noise.

[Trylon]

Why? In the rare cases when something relevant is posted there, it will be reported here by someone without all the noise.

Hear Hear!

[ddb174]

You folks should read the MOUL forums more often.

Why? In the rare cases when something relevant is posted there, it will be reported here by someone without all the noise.

Haha! Plus, one can actually respond to threads here, without 30% of your posts being deleted. But on topic, yeah, I really don't think MQO has anything to do with the lack of open-source, other than Cyan no longer feeling so desperate that they would try something that is for them so uncertain. (I'm not saying that open-sourcing is only caused by desperation, but I do think it was a last-ditch plan for Cyan.) Personally, MQO is a whole lot more interesting to me than Moulagain. I hope it works out for them!

[GPNMilano]

I know the history all too well Milano. You are preaching to the choir here.

Heh, again that wasn't directed at you Aloys, just for everyone. But yes I do know that most of us know the history. I didn't mean to sound like a preacher but more as a fed up politician. Think Bullworth.

The point I (along with other people) am trying to make is not that I'm exigent or impatient; it's just that this fan created content story has been going on for so long and there's no end in sight, and the first news that we have are not what we need to hear.. And as time passes people are leaving the community, and some of those staying are losing motivation. And I fear that when Cyan finally makes uru Open source we'll face a bit of a 'too little too late' situation.. Already many people are leaving for other games (SL etc) and there's more Uru activity going on there than in Uru. How absurd is that?

What people tend to forget is as the fed up ones leave, new people who want to build for Uru are coming in or coming back. Last night alone while Online I had more than a few people asking me where to go to learn how to build ages. Some of which haven't been in the community since the MOUL days, and a few of them were just playing the live game for the first time. I think what we're going to see is a turnover of new age writers vs. old. When I joined the age writing community it was during the MOUL days. I learned we could build ages but that they weren't able to be uploaded yet. So I came here to learn how, and have stuck around. I went from building crappy ages, to building good ages, to helping write the program/writing near Cyan quality ages. So while we're losing community members we gain to ones. And these new ones are taught by the old generation as its getting fed up. It's a vicious cycle.

If there's anything we can do to try and speed things up; to motivate Cyan, or simply to help them, then I think we should do it. That's a constructive way of supporting them.

I do believe there are constructive ways we can support them. The first is in getting started on PyPRP 2. Most of what's in the plugin right now should already start being made ready for a new plugin. The longer we stall on making a plugin compatible with MOUL the longer this will all take. If we had a plugin, capable of at least testing wether or not we can make MOUL ages, it's more likely that Cyan would step up to the plate and help by us test those first MOUL compatible ages. Their internal client is what is needed. We don't have a plugin right now for MOUL, least not one that works. We have servers that can run MOUL (run by a few limited community members here, as well as Cyan as a whole with MOULAgain).

Constructive ways to help:
1. Start repurposing the plugin for MOUL.
2. Old age writers take up the position of teachers to a new generation that is likely to come around. Even if we start by just teaching them to build for CC/POTS. It'll go a long way so that when we get MOUL compatible there won't be a whole lot of "starter" ages.
3. The wiki. Let's add what we know to it. Strictly from an age building perspective.
4. Drizzle tool for converting POTS-MOUL. This ties in with the plugin, if we had a tool that could convert successfully from older plasma to new it would go a long way to getting some of those already released ages ready. I know there are others already working on doing such a thing, and we need to help them in anyway we can.
5. Have a little more patience and sit back and realize that good things come to those who wait. Some of the greatest epics in recent history, in most forms of media, have taken YEARS to complete.
6. We make a detailed letter to Cyan not requesting, but informing them of what the Guild of Writer's needs to get MOUL compatible ages. What precise list of code we need from the Toolset. We don't need the whole of the code right now but we do need snippets. And if those snippets (Aside from the Physics info that they can't release) will help us upgrade the plugin passed what it is and get us ready for a MOUL compatible one, than they're more than likely going to release that small amount of source they can while they ready the stuff they can't. We've been asking so far for all of it when in reality we don't need all of it. We need some of it to complete the stuff we can't do yet. So instead of asking for everything, which includes stuff we don't need. Let's only ask for whatever they can give us that we do need and make a list of those things. Instead of asking for a three course meal ask for an appetizer and you're more likely to get it.

The re-opening of the game will hit the news on the web for another week or so, 90% of the donations will have taken place by that time. Past that point there is little hope for Cyan to make any more money from this. That's when they'll have to take a decision. If there is no visible evolution in the next three weeks, I'll consider it safe to assume that the OS project has entered the twilight zone again. Unless we try to do something and manifest ourselves.

And this is something I can agree on. So, rather than argue about what should have been done by Cyan we need to focus on what we can do. Cyan made a first step cautious step. They opened a server free of charge (except for voluntary donations) to get the community together in one place. Key words "One Place". I think they're stuck in a state of "we don't have resources available to give them what they need to keep going, but we have the resources to get them into one place till we can give them what they need" which is what they did. What we need to do now is focus on age writing/teaching/programming the new plugin. AND we need to decide what we do NEED not what we WANT. A true writer gives his/her audience what they need, not what they really want. That's the tactic we must go by. We can want everything, but we don't really need everything, we just need to figure out what we do need that doesn't include what we want from them.

[Aloys]

You make a number of good points, and I agree with a number of them; but again for those of us who have been here since the beginning (at least for me) it's been a ongoing series of false starts, false hopes and unfullfiled expectations... I do trust Cyan, unfortunately history proves that regarding the Uru tools/source project things never turns out well.
Now MOUL starts again, but that's not what was expected or even needed, and that's aggravating and demotivating to me.
I probably sound like I'm ranting at this point, but this week has been a pretty big let down and I don't see the future getting any brighter. Worst, given Uru's history to me it's getting increasingly harder to simply have faith in Cyan's good will regarding the tools/open source projects. It may just be poor communication on their side, but after all this time I'm having difficulties hearing that argument.

I do understand that MOUL is supposed to be a first step toward the eventual release of the codebase, but we're not getting actual news regarding that. We've offered our help several times, and haven't really heard any concerte reply (positive or negative) other than 'hear hear'. Maybe I'm just running out of energy. We're taking baby steps, at best, when we don't really see any real obstacles to progression. Cyan keep mentionning that they need to plug out 3rd party code and replace it or document the missing parts, if that's the only obstacle that's something we can take care of, we have told them, they won't answer.

I'm going in circles at this point, so I think I'll stay out of this debate for the next week or so and see if there's any news coming from Cyan.

[I.Brattin]

Aloys your not alone. I too don't have the faith I once did. I pretty much expect we will not see Open Source or any tools as Cyan said they would give.

I can see Rand's point that bring back Uru was just step one. So I will hold a wait and see attitude for now. If it happens good, if it don't well I won't be disappointed. I will just continue what I have been doing for the last few months, building ages for Offline.