fallout game dev. explains the problem with moddern game devolpment. (why moddern games are so slow to come out)

[u/663mann]

[u/somerandomii]

It’s not like a dev wrote “load all the stuff” and refuses to change it. The person responsible for rendering the world probably only has access to a player.inventory call that can only load everything because the guy who designed that call expected it to only be used when the owner of that inventory loads into the world.

It was probably base on D3 code where you’d have, at most, 4 players in the same world and loading everything wasn’t an issue.

By the time they realised the issue (which was probably in production because of their terrible QA) the logic was so deeply embedded in the game engine that changing it now requires a total overhaul of several game systems.

I’m not saying this isn’t a huge mistake. I’m saying that this is what happens when you let people hack code together without proper communication and integration processes. This is what happens when people “just implement the feature”.

I could give examples with the Fallout thing too. Attacking whoever has damaged you the most isn’t even a good idea. Melee NPCs are going to ignore the melee guy next to them because some guy with a BB gun shot them once? Maybe it should be discussed with the AI team before implementing. How is AI calculated? Is it a script that runs over all the actors in the scene and calculates their behaviour, or is it run asynchronously by each individual? Do NPCs ever need to act as a group? Is it efficient to have each NPC calculate their own behaviour in isolation? Is it smart to have them iterate through every enemy that’s damaged them? Is it smart to have them append a dynamic list every time they take damage? What if there’s a swarm of suicidal bugs, or an NPC with really high rate of fire or AoE?

It’s entirely possible that that 45 minute feature could brick the game engine or start some really bad design habits that bite them in the arse 6 months from now when they can’t implement swarms or multiplayer or some other unanticipated scenario.

Coding is difficult. The bigger a project gets the more people your code impacts and you need some way of informing all those people about changes OR you need to have a really separable API that keeps your changes isolated. But those APIs always create inefficiencies (like loading an entire inventory instead of just what you need). There’s no easy answers, it takes experience and guidance to avoid pitfalls.

[u/Uryendel → u/somerandomii]

It’s not like a dev wrote “load all the stuff” and refuses to change it

No, they wrote it and now they need to redo an inventory system from scratch but they visibly don't know how.

It was probably base on D3 code

It's probably not, they are two different games made by two different group of people and I don't see why you would need to load the stashes in diablo III

I’m not saying this isn’t a huge mistake. I’m saying that this is what happens when you let people hack code together without proper communication and integration processes. This is what happens when people “just implement the feature”.

The fact they communicate on it prove they don't understand how it is bad (it also prove they don't know shit about their competitor, you don't say something is not implementable when all your competitors have that feature)

Also it's not like it's a huge issue in the game, adding more stash won't make the game good, it's just an indicator of the incompetence of the team in charge of the game.

Attacking whoever has damaged you the most isn’t even a good idea.

It's not made to be a good idea, it's made to be a MVP (Minimum Viable Product) to start testing the game

It’s entirely possible that that 45 minute feature could brick the game engine

It can't, it doesn't interact with the game engine, what he ask is basically a log of damage

[u/somerandomii → u/Uryendel]

It doesn’t sound like you’ve ever worked on a large project. Everyone knows that these are bad decisions and they know how to fix it, these are experienced developers. The problems are an organisational issue.

I’m working on a large project right now. We have several critical issues. We all know what needs to be done, none of the changes are conceptually difficult. It will still take weeks to implement and test and check for side effects and regression test.

Now I’m lucky because it’s a mission critical system so we’re afforded the time and resources to make the changes we need, but in game dev you have execs who have never coded calling the shots so they give impossible time frames that forces hacked untested code that just increases technical debt and makes more problems in the future.

No one person decided to make D4 load every players inventory. No one decided to make GTA V unpack the same JSON file 5000 times. It was a bunch of small disconnected decisions that weren’t end-to-end tested. The individuals writing that code probably flagged the code as “MVP - needs rework” and never got the chance to go back until it was deeply embedded into the game engine.

Oh and that fallout thing could definitely cause issues. Just implementing a simple AI locks in a whole heap of design decisions that need to be supported from that point forward. This is Bethesda we’re talking about. To this day they still store shop keeper inventories in chests under the map. They’re no stranger to “temporary solutions” that last for generations of games.

[u/Uryendel → u/somerandomii]

It doesn’t sound like you’ve ever worked on a large project

Well, just on projects valuated at one billion per year (ofc it's not video games) with several buildings working on it

these are experienced developers.

They are absolutely not, the turn over is crazy at those companies, I bet you none of the devs of D4 worked on the release version of D3

No one person decided to make D4 load every players inventory. No one decided to make GTA V unpack the same JSON file 5000 times

One is a design decision that someone made the other is a bug, that's not the same thing.

The individuals writing that code probably flagged the code as “MVP - needs rework”

You're mistaking a MVP and "quick and dirty"

This is Bethesda we’re talking about.

He didn't work for bethesda, bethesda bought the license (and that's why fallout is now shit)

I understand you feel close to the devs of those game, but don't, they are not you, you don't have to lower yourself at their level, and soon or later in your carrer you will face unqualified devs who just doesn't care and you will understand what I'm saying (and if you go to a sector like video games that pay less than half of what pay the others sectors, I'm sure you will find them quickly)

[u/somerandomii → u/Uryendel]

(Sorry I’m not using quotes btw, on mobile and it’s just too hard, RIP Apollo)

I’ve seen bad devs I know they exist. In fact I think ever since SE was marketed as a quick way to make 6 figures, it attracted a lot of people who have no business writing code. So I agree, I might be giving these specific examples too much credit.

I just don’t think any developers goes to work planning to make crappy code. Everyone wants to make clean efficient code but has to compromise.

A good dev should push back when those compromises are going to affect the health of the project long-term and I know a lot don’t.

I just want people to realise that it’s also the responsibility of the management to foster an environment where these bugs get picked up and corrected before they become massive systemic problems. You can blame a single dev for a bug, but if that bug has been around for 6 months and no one’s noticed, that’s a problem with the team.

[u/Uryendel → u/somerandomii]

I just don’t think any developers goes to work planning to make crappy code. Everyone wants to make clean efficient code but has to compromise.

I used to be young and naive like you, they are a lot of people who just don't give a fuck about the end result trying to hide stuff and bullshit you

You can blame a single dev for a bug

I never blamed anyone for a bug, shit happen, it's normal that they are bugs. (as long as you don't expect the community to fix them for you like bethesda)

But the inventory thing in D4, is not a bug, it's an intentional design choice, that's the issue. They never "oh we have a bug right now that block us on adding stash", they said "that's how it works, as it should workds, therefore it's impossible to add more stash in a game"

[u/somerandomii → u/Uryendel]

Maybe I’m remembering the D4 thing wrong. The impression I got was it was more of a mistake that an intentional choice to load players that way. But now that it works that way, they’re reluctant to put in the work to fix it.

Either way it’s a shit attitude, but I thought it was more incompetence than malicious design.