Wolves, as they are implemented are lame. They amuse for 2-3 minutes, then you tell them to stay where they are because:
a) they teleport into your path.
:cool.gif: their pathfinding is terrible, and they constantly get stuck on stuff and fall into crap to their deaths.
c) their behavior isn't interesting enough to put up with the above.
Now, I'm going to take an educated guess here and say that Peter Molyneux is probably the developer in question that suggested these things. It's right up his ally.
A couple of things to keep in mind with Molyneux: he has great ideas, but his ideas are often way overly ambitious. This is why his games are constantly very late and way over budget. While he's brilliant, he also has a tendency to go way off on design tangents that keep his development teams spinning in circles.
In this case, I think an idea has been suggested that is totally secondary to the core gameplay of Minecraft, which to my mind revolves around exploration and construction. Wolves have nothing to do with either of these. They are entirely secondary to the core gameplay experience.
And on the downside: so far, all the creatures in the game have worked perfectly well with VERY simple AI. Nobody really cares if creepers and sheep fall over cliff edges or what have you. In fact, the very simplicity of this behavior has lead to emergent gameplay in terms of people constructing Mob traps and such.
But PETS are a whole other ballgame. People expect pets to behave logically and in an amusing fashion. Suddenly, you are opening up a whole other AI can of worms. You need GOOD pathfinding to solidify wolves as a feature. You need to code a wide range of interesting behaviours so that they are worth having around. Then of course, you have to debug all of the same.
In other words, I believe that in adding Wolves to the game, you've put yourself on a development slippery slope. You've basically committed yourself to spending a huge amount of development time on a feature that is entirely secondary to your core gameplay experience, and features that are unlikely to be reusable in the rest of the game.
So Notch, I urge you to drop wolves completely, or at least cut your lossess now and leave them in the state they are. There are far more important features that would be great to have in the game, and in working on wolves, you're sacrificing those other features for something that is of little relevance to Minecraft.
you seem to forget that this is beta, not finished, needs polish, has bugs and features that don't quite work right. It will get better if you wait longer than 5 hours.
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join off topic IRC at #otter on esper.net, there is cake*
*there may or may not be cake
I love wolves but yeah their path finding abilities need work. Personally I think teleporting remedies this and is a GOOD thing though. Keep in mind the game is still in beta, always time to improve!
First half- About the wolfs.
I haven't even found one yet. And they will add a whole new level to fights if you do that.
Last half- You complained about everything that came to mind except wolves.
I think his point, if he is not trolling, isn't that the wolves suck. It sounds more like he is saying that he would rather see other, bigger things get some attention, and frou frou stuff like tamable wolves is the wrong direction to go in at this stage.
Personally, I disagree. I like frou frou stuff, so I like the wolves. They behave pretty much like my actual pets do... always stepping underfoot and trying to kill me, so that they can see how much of me they can devour before my body is discovered.
In closing, though, I'd like to add one thing. If you're not willing to read the entire post, then you should probably not reply, and let the post fall off into the archives.
People shouldn't flame this guy, he disagrees with what was done, and wrote a complete, well thought out argument.
However, if you don't like taming wolves, treat them as regular mobs. It's that simple.
On the other hand, the fact that a lot of time is being, and has been, put into developing wolves instead of minecarts, weapons, or enemies that you would have liked to see... well I can't help you there.
Guys, you are missing the point (or didn't bother to read it):
What I am saying is that while, yes, I agree that wolves are a work in progress, in order for wolves to be good, they will require a HUGE amount of development effort that could be better spent elsewhere.
Could they be cool? Yes. But there are a ton of features that could be in the game instead, using the same development time, that would have far more relevance to the gameplay experience, whether that be new block types, crafting recipes, redstone circuit elements, or what have you.
This isn't a gameplay argument about whether wolves could be cool or not. My argument is in terms of effective use of development resources. To my mind, wolves are a huge development black-hole that are going to make the rest of the game suffer for no good reason.
NOTHING is free in game development. Any feature implemented means one other feature that can not be.
I love wolves but yeah their path finding abilities need work. Personally I think teleporting remedies this and is a GOOD thing though. Keep in mind the game is still in beta, always time to improve!
While I partly agree with you and the OP, I have to say that the "Keep in mind the game is still in beta" argument is kind of invalid. I have been developing my own little games, and I have also added buggy features. But NEVER came back to fixing them. You see, Jeb/Notch is probably fine with how the wolves are, so chances are they'll never get an improvement in pathfinding. I do also disagree with the OP saying Notch should scrap wolves. They can be a great addition to the game, provided that minor alterations will ever be made.
Agreed. And nobody said you HAVE to tame them anyways, it just adds some fun to the game.
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Quote from ThatGuyCarth »
I love Blizzard, but god help me, WoW is a giant money engine that uses human souls as fuel.
Agreed. And nobody said you HAVE to tame them anyways, it just adds some fun to the game.
I'm not going to bother with them anymore than I already have, but that doesn't solve my problem:
My problem is all the OTHER features that I'm not going to get to ever play with because of the development time that is going to need to be spent on wolves.
I prefer to live under the impression that if it moves in minecraft, it's stupid. Wolves move, therefore, by minecraft's laws, they are stupid.
I'm not saying that the idea of mobs is stupid... I'm saying that I find it much easier to imagine every single mob muttering "DURRRRRRRrrrrrrrr" when they're around me... except for creepers. Their stupidity is only a facade so they can destroy you in a more humiliating fashion.
I'm at work, so I haven't actually tested out wolves yet, but I'm sure their addition isn't detrimental to the overall experience. And for the record: I hate chickens, because they're tiny (and therefore hard to hit) and I can't push them off a cliff to their death.
I didn't even care to read more than your first 4 lines.
Don't f'ing tame the wolves and they won't be a f'ing problem for ya ? Happy ?
That's too bad because he has a valid point.
Thank you. Glad a few people are actually taking the time to read what I had to say instead of just responding reflexively to the first few lines :smile.gif:
First of all like many have stated.
They have JUST been released and the game is still in BETA.
Of course theres gonna be a few friggen bugs. Just be patient >,>
Also, Notch is going to read this thread. I guarantee it.
And now that I've read the whole thing, I noticed that you just said wolves are terrible and need improvement, then at the end said to leave them how they are. MAKE UP YOUR MIND!
Wolves, as they are implemented are lame. They amuse for 2-3 minutes, then you tell them to stay where they are because:
a) they teleport into your path.
:cool.gif: their pathfinding is terrible, and they constantly get stuck on stuff and fall into crap to their deaths.
c) their behavior isn't interesting enough to put up with the above.
Now, I'm going to take an educated guess here and say that Peter Molyneux is probably the developer in question that suggested these things. It's right up his ally.
A couple of things to keep in mind with Molyneux: he has great ideas, but his ideas are often way overly ambitious. This is why his games are constantly very late and way over budget. While he's brilliant, he also has a tendency to go way off on design tangents that keep his development teams spinning in circles.
In this case, I think an idea has been suggested that is totally secondary to the core gameplay of Minecraft, which to my mind revolves around exploration and construction. Wolves have nothing to do with either of these. They are entirely secondary to the core gameplay experience.
And on the downside: so far, all the creatures in the game have worked perfectly well with VERY simple AI. Nobody really cares if creepers and sheep fall over cliff edges or what have you. In fact, the very simplicity of this behavior has lead to emergent gameplay in terms of people constructing Mob traps and such.
But PETS are a whole other ballgame. People expect pets to behave logically and in an amusing fashion. Suddenly, you are opening up a whole other AI can of worms. You need GOOD pathfinding to solidify wolves as a feature. You need to code a wide range of interesting behaviours so that they are worth having around. Then of course, you have to debug all of the same.
In other words, I believe that in adding Wolves to the game, you've put yourself on a development slippery slope. You've basically committed yourself to spending a huge amount of development time on a feature that is entirely secondary to your core gameplay experience, and features that are unlikely to be reusable in the rest of the game.
So Notch, I urge you to drop wolves completely, or at least cut your lossess now and leave them in the state they are. There are far more important features that would be great to have in the game, and in working on wolves, you're sacrificing those other features for something that is of little relevance to Minecraft.
*there may or may not be cake
They're quite buggy, I've found this out by testing a lot of the wolves I've tamed, and yes they do need work.
But it's beta. It needs work. There's bugs. We just have to wait. If you don't like them, ignore them like any other passive mob.
I haven't even found one yet. And they will add a whole new level to fights if you do that.
Last half- You complained about everything that came to mind except wolves.
go to the suggestions forum of any game and I'm sure you will see (at least in the already suggested section) DOGS YOU CAN TAME!
and yes it will be in caps bcuz the forum mods are tired of people suggesting it.
He added tamable animals bcuz the kids wanted it. That's how I see it.
I'm just going to ignore them. Its a crap idea, done half assed.
Personally, I disagree. I like frou frou stuff, so I like the wolves. They behave pretty much like my actual pets do... always stepping underfoot and trying to kill me, so that they can see how much of me they can devour before my body is discovered.
In closing, though, I'd like to add one thing. If you're not willing to read the entire post, then you should probably not reply, and let the post fall off into the archives.
However, if you don't like taming wolves, treat them as regular mobs. It's that simple.
On the other hand, the fact that a lot of time is being, and has been, put into developing wolves instead of minecarts, weapons, or enemies that you would have liked to see... well I can't help you there.
Im going to make a 2x2 shaft that dispenses dogs on the click of a button. Press button < get dog < wear it out untill it dies < get new dog
Industrial sized dog dispensers...
What I am saying is that while, yes, I agree that wolves are a work in progress, in order for wolves to be good, they will require a HUGE amount of development effort that could be better spent elsewhere.
Could they be cool? Yes. But there are a ton of features that could be in the game instead, using the same development time, that would have far more relevance to the gameplay experience, whether that be new block types, crafting recipes, redstone circuit elements, or what have you.
This isn't a gameplay argument about whether wolves could be cool or not. My argument is in terms of effective use of development resources. To my mind, wolves are a huge development black-hole that are going to make the rest of the game suffer for no good reason.
NOTHING is free in game development. Any feature implemented means one other feature that can not be.
Agreed. And nobody said you HAVE to tame them anyways, it just adds some fun to the game.
I'm not going to bother with them anymore than I already have, but that doesn't solve my problem:
My problem is all the OTHER features that I'm not going to get to ever play with because of the development time that is going to need to be spent on wolves.
That's too bad because he has a valid point.
They were slightly better then expected.
They are decently useful, but nothing special.
I don't think it was worth it's own update, but it was ok.
Also, yes peter is a terrible game developer that no one should look up too.
I'm not saying that the idea of mobs is stupid... I'm saying that I find it much easier to imagine every single mob muttering "DURRRRRRRrrrrrrrr" when they're around me... except for creepers. Their stupidity is only a facade so they can destroy you in a more humiliating fashion.
I'm at work, so I haven't actually tested out wolves yet, but I'm sure their addition isn't detrimental to the overall experience. And for the record: I hate chickens, because they're tiny (and therefore hard to hit) and I can't push them off a cliff to their death.
This.
Thank you. Glad a few people are actually taking the time to read what I had to say instead of just responding reflexively to the first few lines :smile.gif:
They have JUST been released and the game is still in BETA.
Of course theres gonna be a few friggen bugs. Just be patient >,>
And now that I've read the whole thing, I noticed that you just said wolves are terrible and need improvement, then at the end said to leave them how they are. MAKE UP YOUR MIND!