Darkfallinfo Q&A with Tasos : DFO - General / Guide - Discussions

Dev Q&A : Part 1

Here's the first batch of answers from the Q&A I sent to Tasos & Claus. This first batch is answered by Tasos.

US1 Launch
First off, easy question, what did you think of the US1 launch? Was it what you expected, better, or worse?

Launching a Darkfall server is a major operation, a lot of things can go wrong. There were no problems during the US1 launch. The game is extremely stable, the early problems with the account management on the EU server are all fixed so all in all it was a really smooth experience for everyone. We had some queuing during the initial rush when thousands of players were entering the game at the same time, but a couple of days later everything was going very nicely and we have a steady stream of players entering the game every day. We're happy with the N. American launch but what's more important is that the players are happy with it.


Transfers
Biggest question on everyone's plate is the transfer restrictions, can you comment on those?

We said that we would offer character transfers to the N. American players 3 months after the launch of the server to allow N. American server characters to catch up to their EU counterparts. The reason we haven't announced more on restrictions is because we don't know yet if there will be any needed. We are monitoring the situation on both servers. We obviously don't want the N. American server to become unbalanced. So far it seems that there's no reason for concern since our re-balancing efforts seem to be paying off and we expect that the N. American server will be fine. However we reserve the right to make adjustments if they're absolutely necessary.


Hackers
There still seem to be a lot of reports of hackers in the game, do you feel that way on your end? And if so are there top secret plans to seek out and come down on these hackers like 'a ton of bricks'?

No we don't feel that way on our end. The numbers have been very low after the initial mass bannings. We're actively detecting and permanently banning accounts that are hacking. We're also taking measures against players who are exploiting the geometry (terrain, walls, trees, rocks etc.) and also those who are using loot scripts. While the GMs and the players aren't reporting many cases, we've seen a small increase in detections after the N. American server launched. One reason is obviously the expanded player base. Another is an influx of many new players not fully aware of the policies and enforcement. Finally, some old players are risking using expendable accounts thinking they'll gain an edge early on, but that's not going to happen. We're banning at the account owner level now so players who are perma-banned will find it difficult to buy another account.


EU2
Some of the European players are curious about a new server for them to start fresh on, any hints on when that might be available?

EU2 is on our minds, perhaps a couple of months down the road. There's no specific date as of yet but it's definitely in the plans.


Subscriber Only Forums
Can we get a rough estimate on the subscriber forums?

We're working on a way to smoothly integrate these with the existing Darkfall Community rather than the initial plan of having them completely separate. It's something we're currently working on.


NA Publisher
Who is the NA publisher?

The publishing of Darkfall in N. America and in Europe is managed by Aventurine SA with support from and through several partners. The commercial rights to the two territories belong to two different business interests. For all intended purposes Aventurine is self-publishing in N. America with partner and external investor support. The commercial rights to Darkfall for Europe belong to Audio Visual Enterprises which is not involved with the N. American release.

Most game companies using the subscription model, separate their territories especially when infrastructure isn't shared, but in most cases even when it is shared and especially when there are separate business and legal issues involved. In Darkfall's case, a N. American server may not have been possible otherwise. Publishing an MMORPG of this size in a territory such as N. America is a very expensive proposition.