Small edit: My post is regarding the engine part and why that is an issue. Regarding how multiplayer comes into play as a problem? Well I can't say without seeing the source code but that's just one more reason proving my point below: Duct tape in the code of an application is just a bad idea. ^^
Edit 2: BG2 didn't weight dozens and dozens of GB.The level of complexity for games reached a level where you can't simply add or remove some very specific elements that easily.
@Ragnar and @Etruscan -> When you don't understand why something seemingly simple is not done it's usually about money. And what Larian is saying is day and night cycle is an issue on engine level. It's a lot of work for not much to show(Not much , as in for the game to be able to switch between day and night and that's it. Every single mechanic built around for immersion, like npcs doing things etc is a seperate subject.That could be created if the engine allowed a day and night cycle. But it doesn't. ). So we are essentially screwed unless they didn't say anything and actually rebuilt this engine to be able to handle it.
To give you an example of how defining for a project is an issue on engine level:
BG2 was a real time with pause game while being based on D&d. Back then it caused an " outrage" ( a small outrage, cause gaming community 20 years ago was insanely small compared to what it is now). Why would you make a RTwP instead of a turn based game? It makes no sense?
Weeeelll, Bioware received an RTS game engine. It was supposed to be heavilly modified to accomodate a Turn based system but they abandonned that idea and ended up with a fake simulation where every 8 seconds a " turn " elapsed and characters attacked. You could move live without any limitations or turns defining your movement.
Why botter modifying an RTS engine , to make it look like a turn based game engine instead of just making a simple turn based system? Well that same engine does everything else for you. Like literally everything. It renders the map, it has tools for the AI to work properly, to create new maps for the game. You need one to create the game in reasonable amount of time. It's a gigantic piece of dev tools.
In case of BG3 Larian potentially could put some fake light system change ( fake, as in, no system would be based on it. It would work seperately from everything else and serve only the purpose of changing ambient lights). But the amount of issues it would potentially cause and the limitations simply are not worth it. Especially the only purpose( in Larian view as far as i've seen ) of introducing day and night is to have an entire ecosystem built around it. Even if we are fine with the simplest implementation that " simple implementation " would require a shit load of testing ( chasing bugs related with quests AND bugs related with your script running on top of the rules imposed by your engine).
@Ragnarok in case you want to ask : But when the night comes, all nps can receive an order to go to sleep, can't they? Well.... not really, no. They can't. It would be done seperately so you would need to pay attention to every possible scenario + quests + states etc from your day and night script level. Which is straight up unnaceptable. The engine should manage it instead this way subjugating the entire architecture of the application to night and day system requirements. Otherwise you obtain spaghetti code with A LOT of ducktape to make it work. If you ever heard of a game where every patch fixes one issue and creates another then people working on that game did what Larian is asked to do and they deeply regret it to this day.
Can it be argued : Wtf, just update the engine? Yes! It can!! Most likely in BG4 or DOS3 though. OR....they already did it . Cause BG3 sold really good on Day 1 so my small dream is they are simply hiding the fact they are already working on it <3
Last edited by virion; 20/11/22 01:53 PM.
