SGWGame Moderators: Taslo, Sunster02, Stav
Respondents: Dan Elggren, SGW Studio Head
Demetrius Comes, Technical Director
Chris Klug, Creative Director

1. Sunster02 - In addition to the Unreal Engine 3, Cheyenne Mountain also revealed that Stargate Worlds will take advantage of Big World’s client server technology. Do you think that Big World’s Bi-annum revisions will be enough to keep up with today’s ever evolving gaming demands?

Demetrius - Both the Unreal 3 Engine and the Big World server technology provided CME with an excellent foundation to create a AAA MMO. We have had to enhance and extend both engines to better fit our game design as well as to ensure that both engines “play nice together”. I feel the CME engineering staff has done an excellent job finding the balance that allows us to harness the raw power of both engines.

2. Sunster02 - With the hundreds of thousands, if not millions of people working their way from world to world, gate travel is a definite problem that occurs. How do the fine folks at CME purpose to fix the problem on many gamers trying to use the same gate at once?

Dan - We have looked at gate travel and the problems or bottleneck this could cause if we follow the show exactly. We still want to ensure that we give people the opportunity to experience gate travel as intended in the show but will not force people to wait in line for it.

3. Sunster02 - As the game title suggests, the mmorpg deals in Stargate WORLDS. However, is there any chance of the Atlantis expedition dissolving into the story lines?

Chris - Our current plans are to have Atlantis show up in our first big expansion. We’ll see, though.

4. Sunster02 - How has CME coped with the problems that have come from merging Unreal Engine 3 and Bigworld Technology’s, and will we see the fixes play a major role in how we game?

Demetrius - Our engineering staff has spent a good deal of time on the glue that allows us to harness the graphical power of the Unreal 3 Engine as well as leverage the server framework that Big world technology provides. My hope is that you won’t notice the glue we had to create; if you don’t notice it, we did our job well.

5. Sunster02 - While playing on most other mmorpgs, I have noticed that worldwide expedition is limited to how the story line is laid out. For example, on one specific world, only 10-20% of it is available to explore due to the volume of "missions available" there. Will Stargate Worlds have the ability to explore every world, from top to bottom, regardless of "missions" playing a role of where gamers trek?

Chris - Hmm, well, you can explore what you want, but we only build those parts where we have gameplay. So, I guess, as I interpret your question, the answer is ‘no.’ We only build areas where you can play.

6. Stav - Is the game going to have ground up Quad-core support?

Demetrius - The game has ground up multi-core support, the Unreal 3 engine gave us an excellent start in this arena. Unreal 3 provides support for a separate rendering thread and the engineering staff here at CME has expanded that functionality to allow us to parallelize other tasks such as character compositing. The number of parallel tasks running will be proportional to the number of hardware threads available up to a reasonable maximum.

7. Stav - With Ba’al cloning himself it seems like a good way to have a great repeatable quest for instance, will this be introduced in the game?

Chris - We do have various Mission types, but Ba’al’s ability to clone has nothing to do with that.

8. Stav - Is Player verse Player combat going to be added as a integral component at release with specific content, or is it going to be added later as a afterthought?

Dan - We are building a PVE focused game that will encompass the benefits of PVP in the right locations and opportunities. We are also looking at PVP servers and a couple other items that I will keep up my sleeve.

9. Stav - If the game is released with PvP and PvE servers will players on PvE servers that want to PvP, but not be forced to do it 24/7, still have the option to take part in player verse player combat at their discretion?

Dan - If you elect to play on a PVE server you will still have opportunities to opt into PVP combat in certain locations and opportunities.

10. Stav - With the limited character customizing options of the Asgard because of their lack of clothing and armor, will we have a ample amount of drone tweaks and visual looks to make up for that lack?

Chris - Yes, I believe you’ll be happy with the flexibility of the drone.