Will Crossplay ever be implemented?

Alpharos7

ZOS dropped pretty strong hints about crossplay during the recent Blackwood reveal event. It is definitely something they are looking at, but it may be some time before it is introduced. They may have to kill off support for old generation consoles first.

HyekAr

Tandor wrote: »

HalfRain216 wrote: »

Tandor wrote: »

Performance issues and addons are a massive problem with this. Plus, the idea that Microsoft's purchase of Bethesda somehow creates a golden money tree for ESO's developers is wishful thinking and completely unsubstantiated.

Quotes taken from
https://www.theverge.com/21449178/microsoft-xbox-bethesda-zenimax-media-acquisition-xbox-game-pass

Bethesda Game Studios director Todd Howard echoed similar sentiments, saying that it’s Microsoft’s vision that convinced the company to agree to join the Xbox platform. “Why does it matter where the screen is or what the controller is? There are many people without the same access, and we can bring it to them,” he wrote in a post on Bethesda Game Studios

Sounds like a good sign.


As of today’s announcement, Microsoft says it has 15 million Game Pass subscribers. At an average of $10 per user, accounting for some $5 and $1 limited time signups and subscribers of the $15 premium Ultimate subscription, that’s more than $1 billion in annual subscription revenue. Add to that any revenue Microsoft plans to make off third-party games on Xbox consoles and through the Microsoft Store on PC, any console revenue it might earn from the Series X / Series S sales, and full game sales and microtransactions for its first-party titles, and you’ve got a healthy Xbox business.

Microsoft could double its Game Pass revenues with 30 million subscribers. At 50 million, Game Pass is generating an estimated $6 billion a year, more than three times what Fortnite made last year and close to the entire annual revenue of Activision Blizzard, the most valuable third-party game publisher in the industry.

Plus all the in game purchases that will now be going to Microsoft, if they are not a money tree I don’t know what is lol.

I didn't say there wouldn't be a money tree for Microsoft, I said it was wishful thinking and unsubstantiated to think it would be a money tree for ESO's developers.

peraphs they can save on manteinance instead of 3 servers it would be 1, so the resources of xbox server would be for pc server, which might increase the game performance. resting the expenses it is also gaining money, having the same clients

HyekAr

zaria wrote: »

trackdemon5512 wrote: »

@HalfRain216

1. Understand how ESO works differently from other MMORPGs. This games uses "mega servers" versus individualized. As a result every player on a server is immediately able to contact and play with one another with instances rarely being limited.
2. Now imagine a system now cross checking with all mega servers and essentially all players at once without lag. You're starting to get into the problems.
3. Now consider server strain. NA servers don't really experience it but EU PC servers certainly do.Imagine the strain on them solely because of "rush hour" log-ins every day. More trouble.
4. Microsoft has no incentive to build out servers or improve them to an insane degree just to accommodate ESO. It's not Fortnite.

This, cross play on ESO would require them to merge the 3 servers on each continent.
on server level this is possible you get more servers and more instances, you need more Cyrodil and IC campaigns.
However ESO has some bottlenecks, dungeon and BG finder is one, another is the login server.

They would also need to merge the user and character databases so lots would need to rename characters.
And they need to make an tool to move accounts from one database to another first.

wait, isnt it the same account already but with different datebass storeage place?. the big problem i agree with u said, it is the merge process.. and mb thats why they dont want.. mb it would be better if that merge would be voluntary, so they will open a way that those who wants to redirect ro main PC server, wontbe able to merge character, so that should be voluntary, or instead of that, they could give some crowns instead.. as the value of all purchised they re going to lose, so ppl just will start again, but with the crowns in exchange.

Destai

I would LOVE for this to happen, but never expect it. A lot of newer games have done this, but I get the impression that ESO as a technical platform just wouldn't work this way. Given ZOS's track record with bugs and performances woes lasting for years, I just don't have the faith they could pull this off. This kind of architecture had to be decided from the get-go.

IMO, they should just have one ESO account across all platforms, but that's another pie-in-the-sky.

codierussell

People are going way to in depth with this. The answer is no, it will always be no, oh and did I say no? Sony and Microsoft will never play nicely, it has nothing to do with what ZOS wants. I am sure ZOS would love cross play but that would go for every other company that has games solely online.

trackdemon5512

HalfRain216 wrote: »

ThorianB wrote: »

HalfRain216 wrote: »

ThorianB wrote: »

On PC the game is plenty busy. The more people in an area the more systems will struggle to render the game. We want to improve performance not make it worse.

Then why hasn’t performance been addressed and improved?
As consumers we pay for this game under the impression it will work how it is marketed to work.
We are essentially paying there wages and they won’t fix the performance issues and are more concerned with how much money can be squeezed out.

There will be no lack of money or manpower once Microsoft’s acquisition goes through in July.

It isn't that simple. First of all the population of ESO grew by about 20% last year alone that comes out to about 3 million players. Granted all don't stay but the game is significantly more populated than it was just a couple of years ago.

Second, performance has been constantly addressed and improved. CP 2.0 ( U29) actually had performance improvements to cut how many checks the server was required to do. They have also or are also getting new servers this year though the claim it will only make the game more reliable and not directly improve performance. They did several optimizations last year.

Third, the game engine does have limitations. You can only do so much with it and it is likely 10 years or older at this point. There is also a lot of patchwork coding from my understanding.

Fourth, how well the game works for players depends a lot on the players. Some players will be on a rather low end system and trying to do 100 man VS 100 man ball groups in cyro. Some will max their graphics settings and leave them pegged and demand that ZOS fix performance instead of just turning their settings down a few notches.

Each user's experience is going to vary depending on system hardware, settings, and what they are doing in game. ESO runs fine most of the time on my system at ultra graphics for example but im not trying to squeeze 144 FPS at 4k. A lot of people don't understand much about graphics and instead of learning the limitations of their hardware, its easier to blame ZOS for performance issues. For example reducing your resolution from 4k to 2k will greatly improve performance as the game has to render twice as many pixels( roughly) at 4k than it does at 2k. Running a monitor at 144 HZ when you are only getting 70-80 FPS is just wasting resources as your graphics card has to draw each frame twice but the frames are identical. Adjusting little things like these to the correct settings rather than the max settings will greatly improve performance for many people.

The game does have its issues but a lot of these issues can be made a lot more tolerable by using different settings. Older hardware will struggle as time goes on. This is normal in any MMO that is updated regularly. The devs use modern tech and tools and as they do older hardware has a problem keeping up. A PC that ran the game great in 2016, for example, won't run it as well now with the same hardware. But if you get on a modern PC with modern hardware, you can see a pretty decent difference in textures, shadows, etc. in newer areas. Older hardware has a harder time processing newer areas of the game.

So it is not as simple as you make it sound. The devs just can't "fix it" or plug in new hardware and make everything run better. There are many factors affecting why the game may run like crap for you but run fine for me and crash every 30 minutes for player X.

I play on console so I’m not sure what if any settings I could tweak to improve performance?

I do understand what your saying about pc a lot of games I do have to lower the settings to improve lag.

@HalfRain216

So consoles are pretty much locked into standardized performance by Sony, Nintendo, and Microsoft. Limitations are placed on games so that they don't push the systems and yet provide a consistent experience. ESO for example has its graphics and performance settings to have a relatively stable 30FPS frame rate at either 4k or 1080p enhanced on consoles. The former sacrifices extra graphical effects to render 4k worth of pixels. The latter includes additional graphical effects but won't output at 4k to maintain that 30FPS.

Consoles can't be tailored like PC. They're designed for a simplified consumer experience so that people can buy a game and instantly play an excellent experience without having to jump through hoops, all at a standardized fixed price. Consoles also have standards, warranties, etc behind them that guarantee they will play all games that come out for them. Broken games are not released or taken off store fronts. Looking at Cyberpunk 2077 as a recent example.

Merging servers immediately cuts into that. In ESO you're potentially tripling your game population and managing all those individuals at once. If you want to take the strain off the servers you could go the "choose your server" route but then you lose that sense the game world is always populated. Not to mention that the game has been designed for large populations. World bosses, dolmen events, public dungeons, Cyrodiil, group finder, etc are all designed for the current megaserver build. Change to a FF type individual server and all those have to be adjusted.

Then you have conflicting IDs, character names, and drastic imbalances caused by platform. Microsoft might not care between PC and Xbox but the sales on those aren't like Sony. Sony would see players potentially leave their ecosystem for PC and it cuts into their hardware sales. Hardware they sell at a loss.

Lastly player populations are super healthy. You can always find other players no matter what megaserver you're on. Merging servers serves no real purpose but to make things more difficult.

zaria

HyekAr wrote: »

zaria wrote: »

trackdemon5512 wrote: »

@HalfRain216

1. Understand how ESO works differently from other MMORPGs. This games uses "mega servers" versus individualized. As a result every player on a server is immediately able to contact and play with one another with instances rarely being limited.
2. Now imagine a system now cross checking with all mega servers and essentially all players at once without lag. You're starting to get into the problems.
3. Now consider server strain. NA servers don't really experience it but EU PC servers certainly do.Imagine the strain on them solely because of "rush hour" log-ins every day. More trouble.
4. Microsoft has no incentive to build out servers or improve them to an insane degree just to accommodate ESO. It's not Fortnite.

This, cross play on ESO would require them to merge the 3 servers on each continent.
on server level this is possible you get more servers and more instances, you need more Cyrodil and IC campaigns.
However ESO has some bottlenecks, dungeon and BG finder is one, another is the login server.

They would also need to merge the user and character databases so lots would need to rename characters.
And they need to make an tool to move accounts from one database to another first.

wait, isnt it the same account already but with different datebass storeage place?. the big problem i agree with u said, it is the merge process.. and mb thats why they dont want.. mb it would be better if that merge would be voluntary, so they will open a way that those who wants to redirect ro main PC server, wontbe able to merge character, so that should be voluntary, or instead of that, they could give some crowns instead.. as the value of all purchised they re going to lose, so ppl just will start again, but with the crowns in exchange.

For account i thing this is partial true at least for US or EU.
Now platform transfer, yes that would be very nice, between US and EU as people move, between platforms as this changes.
Also as it give an way to back up, restore or roll back accounts.

ZOS has not bothered as it take perhaps one developer month to create.

HyekAr

zaria wrote: »

HyekAr wrote: »

zaria wrote: »

trackdemon5512 wrote: »

@HalfRain216

1. Understand how ESO works differently from other MMORPGs. This games uses "mega servers" versus individualized. As a result every player on a server is immediately able to contact and play with one another with instances rarely being limited.
2. Now imagine a system now cross checking with all mega servers and essentially all players at once without lag. You're starting to get into the problems.
3. Now consider server strain. NA servers don't really experience it but EU PC servers certainly do.Imagine the strain on them solely because of "rush hour" log-ins every day. More trouble.
4. Microsoft has no incentive to build out servers or improve them to an insane degree just to accommodate ESO. It's not Fortnite.

This, cross play on ESO would require them to merge the 3 servers on each continent.
on server level this is possible you get more servers and more instances, you need more Cyrodil and IC campaigns.
However ESO has some bottlenecks, dungeon and BG finder is one, another is the login server.

They would also need to merge the user and character databases so lots would need to rename characters.
And they need to make an tool to move accounts from one database to another first.

wait, isnt it the same account already but with different datebass storeage place?. the big problem i agree with u said, it is the merge process.. and mb thats why they dont want.. mb it would be better if that merge would be voluntary, so they will open a way that those who wants to redirect ro main PC server, wontbe able to merge character, so that should be voluntary, or instead of that, they could give some crowns instead.. as the value of all purchised they re going to lose, so ppl just will start again, but with the crowns in exchange.

For account i thing this is partial true at least for US or EU.
Now platform transfer, yes that would be very nice, between US and EU as people move, between platforms as this changes.
Also as it give an way to back up, restore or roll back accounts.

ZOS has not bothered as it take perhaps one developer month to create.

yes indeed, it will take atleast 1 month to create that. so i think that forced crossplay and character, items transfering it is the unlike part what makes devs not desire crossplaying possibilities. but as i said, if you would have volutary switching system, as it existd between EU and NA servers, it would be good solution, so U would have posibilities to in 1st place chose between xbox or pc community, than EU or NA. (i am not seing between ps and xbox, but from xbox to pc, and from ps to pc., not the opposite, not between xbox ps..)- in this way wont be any issue cz every player will decide by himself where to play, knowing that there is no character tranfering, etc)

in this case, I think many ppl having xbox or ps, starting for the first time the game directly will choose the pc server, and after 5 years, the xbox and ps servers will just dissapear bcse of the lack users, and all will be in the same server, and no crossplaying request

celner4_ESO

I would wayyyyyy rather have cross saving than cross play. Having to rebuy the game and sub on Pc, AND ALL MY crown purchases, it’s infuriating. I hugely regret starting on console, my mistake but jeesh give me a break, not consumer friendly at all not allowing people to keep what they paid for already cross platform.

Edit: I cussed. Forgive me lord.

Celephantsylvius_Bornasfinmo

It would at least (perhaps) cover some of the departures from PC EU regarding raiding or PvP.

In that sense, yes I am up for it.

AVaelham

celner4_ESO wrote: »

I would wayyyyyy rather have cross saving than cross play. Having to rebuy the game and sub on Pc, AND ALL MY crown purchases, it’s infuriating. I hugely regret starting on console, my mistake but jeesh give me a break, not consumer friendly at all not allowing people to keep what they paid for already cross platform.

Edit: I cussed. Forgive me lord.

I think it's too late for cross play or cross save sadly. I agree it is really disheartening to start again from scratch. I started playing on XBOX EU in 2018 additionally to my original PC EU account (mostly due to my PC being a potato and the PC EU server being a mess) and I had to essentially buy the expansions twice to play on console too. The problem is now I have characters on both servers, would I lose them on one of them? I doubt ZOS would give me more than 18 characters slots or something.

HyekAr

NEVER

celner4_ESO

AVaelham wrote: »

celner4_ESO wrote: »

I would wayyyyyy rather have cross saving than cross play. Having to rebuy the game and sub on Pc, AND ALL MY crown purchases, it’s infuriating. I hugely regret starting on console, my mistake but jeesh give me a break, not consumer friendly at all not allowing people to keep what they paid for already cross platform.

Edit: I cussed. Forgive me lord.

I think it's too late for cross play or cross save sadly. I agree it is really disheartening to start again from scratch. I started playing on XBOX EU in 2018 additionally to my original PC EU account (mostly due to my PC being a potato and the PC EU server being a mess) and I had to essentially buy the expansions twice to play on console too. The problem is now I have characters on both servers, would I lose them on one of them? I doubt ZOS would give me more than 18 characters slots or something.

I think that problem is easily solved by creating a new Pc account and linking console to that account. If you want characters you have on a already created account on PC merged with your console account or vice versa that’s a separate issue. To not have cross save for items you purchased is inexcusable at this point and seemingly predatory insomuch that they make money to people who swap and repurchase game, sub, and/or crowns. If that’s not the case and it’s innocent helplessness due to their own lack of ability to keep with the times than that’s a failed business to not have any longevity and competition planned for a market that evolves and will constantly evolve I.e. the cross save/ cross play evolution. And the money made from the games store purchases alone for one fiscal year could pay the way for implementation of those 10 fold. I understand the complications of cross play but if console has a choice to opt in knowing the disadvantages, solved. If the economy is the worry than they need to improve console performance enough to where players don’t feel forced to swap enable to have enjoyable gameplay. If they can scrap the crappy trader system for a universal auction house and make that cross platform that could be an answer for the economy worry. I’m armchair developing right now with ideas purely as a point of this is their job and they can figure it out if they care for the growth of their game, their business.

Regardless these issues need addressing and changes made if they want any hope for this game as a business to compete and continue to grow. Making a live service game that’s an mmo where it’s literally the point of being a live service game to continue as long as possible, but to refuse to even attempt improve and change where very much so necessary is suicide in any business.

They mentioned cross play and cross save during the Blackwood launch and I do believe cross save is much more likely based on the commentary. But they definitely hurting themselves not making it a priority from all the console players who are quitting because of the games performance but won’t start over on pc. Though the whales who do start over and go ham on the store maybe make it difficult for them to want to make cross save possible :P I’m hopeful, but still annoyed absolutely

Wolf_Eye

I can think of two very major issues:

Crossplay would mean that no one on consoles would ever get leaderboards for trials and arenas because PC people and their addons would always come out on top, leading to an unfair advantage.

Also the market....since PC has addons to help with daily writs, they usually are able to get more money quickly. So there'd be a "class divide" where the PC people would always be richer than the console people. The console people would never be able to afford things as the PC people would always price them out of it.

The market price for many items on PC tends to soar a LOT higher than the market price for those same items on console. Like, I don't think Chromium platings are running 200K gold per piece on consoles are they?

And then there's the extra lag, as people mentioned...

And I personally don't want to change all my characters names and my @ name just because of crossplay. I'm very attached to them.

I just see too many issues for it to be a reality.

Xebov

The idea surfaces every now and then and usually comes from Console players that would like to migrate to PC. There are various reasons why Crossplay will likely never happen.

Technical Reasons:
Each Server on each plattform has its own database. This means that things like guild names and player names can be duplicated. A crossplay feature would require these databases to be merged, which is a nightmare. Transfers from PC to console on the release of the console version only worked because the console database was still empty.

Legal Reasons:
Console players are customers of the respective console manufacturer. This means that everything these players buy in terms of abos, crowns or DLCs creates income for these companies. Having crossplay would mean they could buy it everywhere else or leave the plattform. Which is not in the interest of these companies. Now the game is owned by Microsoft, but XBOX is still a seperated division which has seperated income goals.

Community Reasons:
Thanks to addons players on PC can do things console players cannot, they are also way richer. This menas that crossplay would mean that console players would have an issue affording anything in the way larger and more expansive PC economy.

kargen27

"Each Server on each plattform has its own database. This means that things like guild names and player names can be duplicated."

and simply changing names before transfer wouldn't work because everything that character has and has done is linked to the name in a way it would be difficult to go in and re-associate with the new name.

Rex-Umbra

Those that say it can't happen have no idea what they are talking about. Very Easy to have an internal code for accounts so they can have James@PC James@XB James@PS or some other internal code for the name issue. Addons are less and less of a big deal now not to mention add ons are possible for console in the same way Bethesda has mods for skyrim and fallout.

Xebov

kargen27 wrote: »

"Each Server on each plattform has its own database. This means that things like guild names and player names can be duplicated."

and simply changing names before transfer wouldn't work because everything that character has and has done is linked to the name in a way it would be difficult to go in and re-associate with the new name.

Thats the smaller issue, the much bigger issue would be that some players would have to give up their character or guild names in the first place which is almost always problematic.

Elo106

Cross save would probably be better, you connect with PC you play on the PC Server NA or EU.
You connect to console you play on that server, but regardless it would be your characters.

So play a bit on console, log out, continue on PC etc.

AdamLAD

It's not impossible but its extremely difficult, theres a host of different problems with it. It will be years if we get it. The devs want to work on improving the game as it is now rather than tackling that huge major obstacle alongside the multitude of problems they have now. I can definitely see it happening eventually but its YEARS away. Hence why I will be grinding up PC EU when i eventually get my PC

Elsonso

Personally, I think this might happen between XBox and PC. After that, PC and XBox players will eventually be able to play with Playstation players. All that has to happen is for the Playstation players to decide on PC or XBox when they switch platforms.

Vhozek

Nestor wrote: »

Back at console launch, players could copy to the consoles, so lots of dups.

PC Players have Addons, unfair advantage

PC players that don't use addons are at a disadvantage so that's not an argument.
Crossplay needs to be a thing for every game today.

AVaelham

Xebov wrote: »

Legal Reasons:
Console players are customers of the respective console manufacturer. This means that everything these players buy in terms of abos, crowns or DLCs creates income for these companies. Having crossplay would mean they could buy it everywhere else or leave the plattform. Which is not in the interest of these companies. Now the game is owned by Microsoft, but XBOX is still a seperated division which has seperated income goals.

That doesn't seem to be a problem for Bungie and Destiny 2 where cross-save and cross-play are now a thing. But even there you have to buy expansions (chapters) for each platform

MiserynCompany

All of us who transferred to PC from consoles and regrinded and repurchased everything have been through this discussion with ZOS to no avail, and tbh it would be a huge slap in the face to a good bit of loyal customers at this point if they hand out these transfers now. They have repeatedly stated that this is not possible, this was a one time thing for players going from pc to console at launch and the way things are set it is actually not possible to transfer anyone's account from one platform to another. They will not transfer your progress, your name, your purchases. They are not rude about it, and seem to be pretty understanding most of the time about how awful the situation is, but I wouldn't sit there banking on ZOS giving account transfers in the near future. JS.

Cillion3117

This will require Microsoft and Sony to work together. I wouldn't hold my breath for that...

DrSlaughtr

XB and PS would be nice but Sony doesn't like cross play.

kargen27

Xebov wrote: »

kargen27 wrote: »

"Each Server on each plattform has its own database. This means that things like guild names and player names can be duplicated."

and simply changing names before transfer wouldn't work because everything that character has and has done is linked to the name in a way it would be difficult to go in and re-associate with the new name.

Thats the smaller issue, the much bigger issue would be that some players would have to give up their character or guild names in the first place which is almost always problematic.

Nah it's not the smaller issue because if they don't get it right it can corrupt the entire data base and have an affect on accounts that were not a part of the transfer.

HyekAr

It wont happen bcz it is extra work for ZOS, which will bring them huge headaches after it every time when some crash will happen. And there is no economic benefit from it, but having no crossplay force ppl to buy the game again

Thannazzar

PC Master Race
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Mjz6j_CUzA

celner4_ESO

Remember people who said it wasn’t possible for a transmog system with full dye capabilities to weapons because it was too much tedious work and wouldn’t be possible because of how the game had been made.

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/358938/weapon-dyes-weve-waited-and-waited-shields-only-really/p1

[snip]

is cross save the same kind of problem to be solved as transmog or weapon dying? Of course not… it’s a problem, but it could be solved. Any company that says something isn’t possible to their customers don’t last long. Steve Jobs actually gives a great seminar about that back years ago, as well as speaking about financial and legal departments getting the promotions in the companies with products. And when product development isn’t getting promotions because they are passionate abo the product and not as ambitious as financial, you see the product get cheaper and the company falls. Was a fascinating seminar I don’t think ZoS is failing in showing their passion for their product in development and though cross saving is a tricky problem they made for themselves, they could make it work. People said the dye system for weapons and a transmog system was supposedly a waste of time and resources. They did it. They could put the time and resources to figure out the cross saving issue. Unless ZoS says absolutely not (which they didn’t even recently with the black wood launch), than people who aren’t working in development for them can’t speak for them on why they can’t do it I’m not saying they can, I’m saying it could be possible, and they’ve not said it’s impossible.

[edited for baiting]