1. #1

    Replays

    I'm just going to paste a few bits that Sebbbi wrote in the Trials forum on Xbox.com..

    We are prepared to have tens of thousands user created tracks during the game lifetime. This will be a huge amount of data, so it's not possible to store user created track leaderboards or replays to the Xbox Live online game storage. Your best times and replays (of each user created track) will be saved to your own hard drive. If you like, you can copy your user created track replays to your own and your mates' Xbox memory units for transportation.


    The replays are very well compressed (only few kilobytes each), so it only takes around a second to download a replay from Xbox Live. The replay watching has also new features compared to Trials 2 SE. Now you can fast forward the replay, pause/restart the replay and rotate/pan the replay camera.


    Its a shame that we cant view replays from each other's custom tracks, I understand why, but its still a shame! Shame we cant transfer if we both were on line say!...

    Like the new features for the replays though!

    On that bit, there's a little controllor as such showing the users input. What if the player uses the d pad and buttons? It looked like in the new video that it shows analouge! Would the display just show full movements?
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  2. #2

    Re: Replays

    Dpad and button usage just means full analog movement so it's not a problem for the replay viewing.

    Also, Sebbbi is wrong about the "If you like, you can copy your user created track replays to your own and your mates' Xbox memory units for transportation." You basically cannot do that as only the replay creator can watch the replay and if some other profile uses that track/replay file it is treated like it doesn't yet have his/her own replay (and hence the replay cannot be shown). This function is there to allow copying tracks with MUs, otherwise you would probably be stuck with the best score/replay of the previous owner.
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  3. #3
    sebastianaalton's Avatar Trials Developer
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    Re: Replays

    Originally Posted by Jorma
    You basically cannot do that as only the replay creator can watch the replay and if some other profile uses that track/replay file it is treated like it doesn't yet have his/her own replay
    You can do this easily. Just copy your profile to the memory unit as well as your replays (track files).
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  4. #4
    Dosto's Avatar Senior Member
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    Re: Replays

    So no leaderboards :l
    What is the point of user made tracks if we can't compete on those..
    Beating your friends is the whole point of this game.

    Well it's nice to have the editor. but still :'( buuhuu
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  5. #5
    sebastianaalton's Avatar Trials Developer
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    Re: Replays

    Originally Posted by Dosto
    So no leaderboards :l
    What is the point of user made tracks if we can't compete on those..
    There is only limited leaderboard and storage space in the Xbox Live servers allocated for each Xbox Live game, so it's not technically possible to have global online leaderboards in all of the user created tracks. We could have leaderboards for around 100 user created tracks, but that's not even one percent of (roughly) estimated one million user created tracks. If the game sells for example 300 000 copies, one million user created tracks is going to be easily done (under 3 tracks for each player during the whole game life time). To store the leaderboards and replays of all these tracks online would take huge amount of storage space and bandwidth.

    If we release a full AAA retail box game in the future, it might be possible for us to get our own user created content server network. Maintaining a fault safe network like this is pretty expensive, so it's not a thing that a developer does on it's own. It's usually a collaboration between the publisher and the console manufacturer (for ex. LittleBigPlanet). So having online leaderboards and replays in all of the user created tracks is just not feasible for a pretty small budget Xbox Live Arcade game. It's only feasible for the highest budget AAA platform selling titles. Let's hope that Trials HD sells well, and we have this option in the future!
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  6. #6

    Re: Replays

    This really sucks, and makes level editing quite useless imo. Why would I bother downloading a level if I could never compete against anyone on it? Why would I bother creating levels if I could never see anyone play my levels? There goes my dream of weekly competitions on user created levels.

    You could at least have a top 100 leaderboard on each level. How much space would that take? Even a top 10 leaderboard would be MUCH better than nothing at all.

    I hope you will release some packs of community created levels for everyone to play, so that people creating tracks would have some motivation doing so.
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  7. #7
    sebastianaalton's Avatar Trials Developer
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    Re: Replays

    Originally Posted by ToaTheBoa
    You could at least have a top 100 leaderboard on each level. How much space would that take? Even a top 10 leaderboard would be MUCH better than nothing at all.
    Unfortunately even a global top 1 leaderboard for each user created track would not be technically possible with the default live feature set. Without going to technical details, I can only say that we are already utilizing everything we can currently. Our leaderboard functionalities are considerably more advanced compared to any other Xbox Live Arcade game.

    Originally Posted by ToaTheBoa
    I hope you will release some packs of community created levels for everyone to play, so that people creating tracks would have some motivation doing so.
    This could be possible in the future. Of course we would need to sign contracts with you to be able to use your copyrighted material.
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  8. #8

    Re: Replays

    I dont wanna be too negative, but this REALLY stifles the game's growth and longevity. It almost renders the level editor obsolete. After all the game is 100% about leaderboards & ranking, and I was looking forward to seeing other people's creative solutions to my own tracks, as I'm sure others were too.

    I really hope you will add more tracks along the way, even if they're from Redlynx.

    Or have some kind of monthly (or whatever) contest where the best user-made track gets official and makes it onto the game. Otherwise, 40 or 50 or so tracks will soon become a bit "same old", just like in T2SE.

    This game seems to have a lot of potential, it's just sad to see its progress being hindered by what partly seems like legal mumbo jumbo and technical issues that I'm sure could be solved somehow..
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  9. #9

    Re: Replays

    Can't you just write in the EULA that all the player created tracks belongs to the creators of the game?
    In Far Cry 2 everyone can download the user created tracks, since Ubisoft owns them.
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  10. #10

    Re: Replays

    Maybe it would be possible somehow to allow transfers of replay on a certain user created track to your friend on your friends list!

    For instance, I create a track and say NorfaiR downloads it. I aready have my replays or best replay for that track and so does NorfaiR on his xbox! When we both are online at the same time, I could sent NorfaiR my replay of my track and vise versa!

    Storage would not be a problem then nor bandwidth as its our own and not Xbox! I know as you have said that both tracks and replays are very little in size so its only almost like sending a request in data size!

    If this was possible it would open doors for everyone!

    Weekly user made challenges could still be done etc etc!

    This would not only benefit the regular users, but also casual ones too!
    This I guess would also create a local leaderboard as its on our own xbox and not on the servers! Its almost like having as you said before, off line leaderboards with various profiles! All thats happening it that a tiny tiny amount of data is sent to each other when both or more parties are on at the same time and thus creating the off line leaderboard!


    I think its halo 3 maybe where you can send a video to online friends in the sense of file transfer! If your not on that game, it wont work! But thats expected!

    I as much as we all say we would like this feature and as much as you want to give it, we all know what the answer is going to be! But surely its something that is possible without confusing things and involving server qoutas etc, which doesn't really seem relevent?

    When I chat to people on xbox, that data far more than this!
    I can transfer anything over msn or yahoo or gmail and so on without limitations... to a degree! But I guess the point is, its our choice. Our xbox, our bandwidth! Not Microsofts!

    I hope that made sense and I wasn't diggin at you guy's because I now you would give it if it was possible and as easy as that!
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