Hardware and Software

From Stargate Worlds Wiki (SGW)

[edit] Engine

Cheyenne Mountain Entertainment are using the Big World Technology as their development platform and Unreal 3 as their graphics engine in the development of Stargate Worlds. And for all those who are wondering, Unreal 3 means that the game will utilize Direct X.^[1]

[edit] Graphics

Utilizing the Bigworld technology suite and supporting Direct X10 Stargate Worlds will provide a dazzling visual experience. For some examples check out the screenshots^{[2] [3][4]}

[edit] System Requirements, Operating Systems and Consoles

Currently the public plan is to release Stargate Worlds only on the PC. However CME have indicated that they would like to release the game for other operating systems and consoles, most likely the XBox360.^[5][6][7] There are no definitive set of system requirements at this stage, and they are unlikely to be available till much closer till the release of the game. It is expected that any current middle to high end PC will be able to run the game. ^[8] Better hardware will result in a better graphics experience. The team is using dual 3GHz Xenon CPUs with dual cores with 4 gigs of RAM 512 Meg Nvidia GeForce 7900 GT as their development platform.^[9] And while the game is currently being built for Windows XP, it will support Vista as well.^[10]

At this stage, whilst the devs would like to support it, no decision has yet been made regarding dial-up.^[11]

[edit] Client and User Interface

Cheyenne Mountain Entertainment is using the Bigworld technology suite which provides both client and server components for MMOs. Players will see the worlds through the third person perspective, but can zoom in and out.^[12] The player will also have significant camera control.^[13] Players will mainly be using their mouse to control their character but the keyboard will be an important tool, particularly for chat.^[14]

The developers intend to provide as much flexibility in allowing users to customize their UI. This may include placing bars where they want and resizing windows.^[15] In addition CME hopes to foster a thriving mod community and are engineering the game to allow the UI to be heavily modded.^[16]

[edit] Servers

Stargate Worlds will have multiple servers or shards to house all the players. At this stage the nominal population of shards will be about 4000.^[17] Server's may be able to compete against each other. This may take the direction of achieving higher stats than the other server or more directly battling other servers, such as World of Warcraft's cross-realm battlegrounds.^[18] There will be both PvE and PvP servers.^[19]It seems that PvE servers will form the majority at the beginning. In PvE servers you can engage other players only if you duel, and later, when battlegrounds are implemented, in those too. In PvP servers, you can engage other players at any time anywhere, except certain areas like newbie zones.^[20] It has not yet been stated, whether there will be RP servers.

The servers arent restricted by the location of the player. A player can log to a different timezone server, if he/she so wishes, and play the characters which he/she has on that server.^[21]

The physical servers are likely to be Linux clusters with multiple processor PC's with lots of RAM and very little disk space and they may be manufactured by IBM.^[22][23] The Bigworld suite presents several significant features in server management such that restrictions on server size will be based around gameplay and community considerations, not hardware.^[24]

As for the physical server infrastructure itself the developers hope to meet consumer demand and provide the minimal latency practicable. Given that one of the game's major audiences is an international one servers are likely to be located in multiple countries.^[25]

[edit] References

1. ↑ A post by Jake Simpson, Also Known As, JakeTheBloke - 2 September 2006
2. ↑ A Press Conference Call with Joe Ybarra, David Adams, and Sara Baker - 15 February 2006
3. ↑ A post By Jason Bucher - Senior Client Engineer, Also Known As, Wodash On The Stargate Worlds Forums. - 17 March 2006
4. ↑ A post By Nick Heitzman - Lead Artist, Also Known As, Dominic On The Stargate Worlds Forums. - 14 March 2006
5. ↑ The Stargate Worlds FAQ
6. ↑ From a Ten Ton Hammer Interview with Joe Ybarra
7. ↑ A post By Joe Ybarra - Vice President of Product Development, Also Known As General Hammond On The Stargate Worlds Forums.
8. ↑ AStargate-Welten Interview with Jake Simpson - 31 August 2006
9. ↑ A post by Colin McLaughlan, Also known as, Kaadian, on the Stargate Worlds Community Forums - 20 September 2006
10. ↑ A post by Colin McLaughlan on the SGW Community Forums
11. ↑ Developer Q&A Podcast Episode 2 - 22 August 2007
12. ↑ Live Developer Chat on MMORPG.com – 8 November 2007
13. ↑ From an IGN Interview with Chris Klug. - 23 June 2006
14. ↑ From a Stargate-Welten Interview with Jake Simpson - 31 August 2006
15. ↑ A post on the SGW community forums by David Cook - 22 August 2007
16. ↑ Developer Q&A: [3] - 1 October 2007
17. ↑ A podcast interview with Joe Ybarra and Kevin Balentine from Virginworlds.com – 22 March 2007
18. ↑ A Press Conference Call with Joe Ybarra, David Adams, and Sara Baker - 15 February 2006
19. ↑ An IGN.com article: Stargate Worlds Peek #1 – 9 March 2007
20. ↑ From the Ask Our Creative Director Ledaye forum thread with Chris Klug. - 6 Feb 2008
21. ↑ From the Ask Our Creative Director Ledaye forum thread with Chris Klug. - 18 Feb 2008
22. ↑ A Post By Jay Adan - Director of Marketing and PR, Also Known As Jay Adan on the Stargate worlds forums. - 14 December 2006
23. ↑ A Post By Colin McLaughlan - Director of Technology, Also Known As Kaadian on the Stargate worlds forums. - 5 August 2006
24. ↑ From an IGN Interview with Chris Klug. - 23 June 2006
25. ↑ An Audio Podcast: Developer Q&A Part 1 – June 29 2007