How is Cross-Play not a priority?

MISTFORMBZZZ · November 14

ZOS_Kevin wrote: »

So crossplay is a priority. As we have noted, we are actively exploring everything that crossplay would touch. Because all of that is additional dev work. We cannot stress this enough, this is a massive undertaking that requires meticulous investigation to make sure we factor in every aspect of ESO. Additionally we will need to building in time to either build or overhaul systems to make sure it works with crossplay without causing a ton of issues. And for an 11 yr old game that didn't have crossplay in mind when it was being build (since crossplay was not an industry feature yet) we would rather take the time to do this right.

I can assure you, if this was a matter of just flipping some switches to get crossplay online, we would have done that a long time ago. We are just as eager to get crossplay online so that you can play with anyone regardless of platform choice. But the time we are taking for crossplay is needed.

Thank you for your statement Kevin. While agreeing it needs to be done propperly to not mess things up, it feels like it should of been a priority earlier.
I know im just one voice but i have actively warned of the population shrinking for plus two years now.

At some point it just feels to late now. Obviously we dont have the actualy numbers, but it´s no doubt the server where i am playing on, PS EU has suffered a lot and lost a massive chunk of players.

It is a bit like when we said we need new better servers and ZOS denied it would change anything. Then a way to long time later we got new servers and the game ran fluid and perfect, performance wise ( at least for consoles). But it was to late ,many people stopped already.
Respectfully i hope this goes better in the future.

Poss · November 14

ZOS_Kevin wrote: »

So crossplay is a priority. As we have noted, we are actively exploring everything that crossplay would touch. Because all of that is additional dev work. We cannot stress this enough, this is a massive undertaking that requires meticulous investigation to make sure we factor in every aspect of ESO. Additionally we will need to building in time to either build or overhaul systems to make sure it works with crossplay without causing a ton of issues. And for an 11 yr old game that didn't have crossplay in mind when it was being build (since crossplay was not an industry feature yet) we would rather take the time to do this right.

I can assure you, if this was a matter of just flipping some switches to get crossplay online, we would have done that a long time ago. We are just as eager to get crossplay online so that you can play with anyone regardless of platform choice. But the time we are taking for crossplay is needed.

People have been calling for crossplay for years. Only now that the population is genuinely struggling especially on consoles have ZoS decided that maybe crossplay is a good idea. Up until recently, your official response regarding crossplay was that it’s not on the agenda.

By the time crossplay comes, population will be irreparable

My guild has recently transitioned from Xbox EU to NA, started the entire grind again. We’ve decided to ditch the last 10 years in a game we love entirely for a more populated server. The grind has been horrible and I guarantee you the average casual player would rather just leave the game. Crossplay needs to come yesterday

MISTFORMBZZZ · November 14

Poss wrote: »

ZOS_Kevin wrote: »

So crossplay is a priority. As we have noted, we are actively exploring everything that crossplay would touch. Because all of that is additional dev work. We cannot stress this enough, this is a massive undertaking that requires meticulous investigation to make sure we factor in every aspect of ESO. Additionally we will need to building in time to either build or overhaul systems to make sure it works with crossplay without causing a ton of issues. And for an 11 yr old game that didn't have crossplay in mind when it was being build (since crossplay was not an industry feature yet) we would rather take the time to do this right.

I can assure you, if this was a matter of just flipping some switches to get crossplay online, we would have done that a long time ago. We are just as eager to get crossplay online so that you can play with anyone regardless of platform choice. But the time we are taking for crossplay is needed.

People have been calling for crossplay for years. Only now that the population is genuinely struggling especially on consoles have ZoS decided that maybe crossplay is a good idea.

By the time crossplay comes, population will be irreparable

My guild has recently transitioned from Xbox EU to NA, started the entire grind again. We’ve decided to ditch the last 10 years in a game we love entirely for a more populated server. The grind has been horrible and I guarantee you the average casual player would rather just leave the game. Crossplay needs to come yesterday

I know for a fact i would not restart after 10y progress and thousands of euros invested in my account.
Not to start with my pvp guild, it was a progress over months to decide and convice everyone to switch alliance.

No way people would restart from scratch on another platform.

Specially when its not our fault, the population is in that state

DreadKnight · November 14

ZOS_Kevin wrote: »

So crossplay is a priority. As we have noted, we are actively exploring everything that crossplay would touch. Because all of that is additional dev work. We cannot stress this enough, this is a massive undertaking that requires meticulous investigation to make sure we factor in every aspect of ESO. Additionally we will need to building in time to either build or overhaul systems to make sure it works with crossplay without causing a ton of issues. And for an 11 yr old game that didn't have crossplay in mind when it was being build (since crossplay was not an industry feature yet) we would rather take the time to do this right.

I can assure you, if this was a matter of just flipping some switches to get crossplay online, we would have done that a long time ago. We are just as eager to get crossplay online so that you can play with anyone regardless of platform choice. But the time we are taking for crossplay is needed.

Whilst this is great communication, and much appreciated, it sounds like the work that needs to be done is still in the planning stages. If that is true, and going by how long historically it takes for any requested changes to be implimented, we're probably talking several years rather than months. This will be simply far too long to save the game in my opinion.

Ulvich · November 14

Image having to change your name after 7 years because someone else has had it for 8. What would you do?

ADarklore · November 14

Well, with the death of New World... this just added more players to ESO's roster. There is little to no other MMOs coming out in the near future, and industry experts say that there is very little enthusiasm for ANY gaming company to develop another MMO. So what this means is, if you want to play an MMO, you'll be limited with your choices to pretty much what's available now. The future seems very bleak for any MMOs currently in development as well- with a few teetering on cancellation. The LOTR game is done... even though some say, "There hasn't been any official announcement"... but when the entire studio that was developing it is shut down... do they really need to announce it? In fact, one of the directors on the game stated, directly, that LOTR was cancelled... but apparently for some that's not 'official' enough.

Thus, the MMOs that are currently active are in a much better position. As the choices become more limited, it's going to force players to either play what's available, or don't play an MMO at all. I honestly fear for the future of gaming altogether. With AI being pushed hard, what that will do is make it easier for studios to develop bad games for little money- and if it sells, great, if not, no loss. Gone are the days when studios actually depend on a high quality game to generate enough revenue to pay development costs plus a profit.

Madarc · November 14

Reading through all kinds of ESO forums, it's clear that the community (TESO) is often very skeptical about Zenimax's announcement that it will implement cross-play after all – contrary to earlier statements that this was not technically or economically feasible.
Players are questioning whether this new commitment is credible, especially after trust was further shaken by the recently criticized in-game event.

Where exactly are the technical and structural hurdles?
Crossplay naturally requires a fundamental restructuring of the game architecture, as the game was not originally designed for it. Merging the platforms, each with two regions (NA/EU), involves a massive technical effort.
I see potential name conflicts as well and server stability after the merge as particularly critical issues.

We accuse ZOS of not being transparent enough. Why...? Should be clear:
Although it has been confirmed that crossplay is being worked on, there are no concrete details or timelines. Many players perceive this as a delaying tactic. The long history of non-responses and vague statements has severely damaged confidence in the development.

And what economic and social consequences could this have?
A potential cross-play server could further deplete the console player population, as users could switch to PC -especially if cross-save or item transfer is enabled. There are also concerns that PC players would have an advantage with add-ons, which could lead to imbalances in PvP and the economy.
So what are my realistic expectations?
Although crossplay is now considered technically feasible, i expect that implementation will take a very long time - comparable to other complex updates such as the swimming horse feature, which took nine months.

I think a complete migration to PC servers would be sad and radical, but it would be a much simpler solution and probably one that would work better.
As usual: just my2cents

Erickson9610 · November 14

Ulvich wrote: »

Image having to change your name after 7 years because someone else has had it for 8. What would you do?

That's simply not going to happen. The character data is still distinguished by which server and platform it's on.

"Adam (PC/NA)" is different from "Adam (PS/NA)" and "Adam (XB/NA)". The most intuitive solution is to place a symbol next to the name, just like how other games with crossplay manage it.

Another solution would be to allow duplicate character names in general — we already have account names as special identifiers. Any duplicate account names are then distinguished by their platform.

M0R_Gaming · November 15

Gabriel_H wrote: »

fizzybeef wrote: »

Gabriel_H wrote: »

React wrote: »

Crossplay would probably help dramatically with the endgame community. I can only imagine though that this feature is still 1-2 years out minimum, and who knows if there will be any endgame players left at all by the time it arrives.

Depends massively on what addons are available on Console - and I mean maintained addons not ripped off ones. Of course you can do PvE end-game without addons, but good luck convincing a HM raid lead to bring your healer without Hodor's ulti-share addon for example.

There is a addon on consoles called arteum group tool, where you can set that people in your group can see your ult percentages like if its ready or not. If you mean that

The issue is, is it a maintained addon or someone ripping off others work.

It is maintained. It also uses the same library as hodors, so people can use either hodors or Artaeum and the raid lead will still see their ultimate in their preferred addon. Actually it is more updated on console than it is on PC lol, I need to backport some of the console changes to PC for improved preformance

Also, now hodors is maintained officially, same with codes + crutch, and there is an elms alternative/upgrade (more markers) which is maintained on both platforms as well.

fizzybeef · November 15

ADarklore wrote: »

Well, with the death of New World... this just added more players to ESO's roster. There is little to no other MMOs coming out in the near future, and industry experts say that there is very little enthusiasm for ANY gaming company to develop another MMO. So what this means is, if you want to play an MMO, you'll be limited with your choices to pretty much what's available now. The future seems very bleak for any MMOs currently in development as well- with a few teetering on cancellation. The LOTR game is done... even though some say, "There hasn't been any official announcement"... but when the entire studio that was developing it is shut down... do they really need to announce it? In fact, one of the directors on the game stated, directly, that LOTR was cancelled... but apparently for some that's not 'official' enough.

Thus, the MMOs that are currently active are in a much better position. As the choices become more limited, it's going to force players to either play what's available, or don't play an MMO at all. I honestly fear for the future of gaming altogether. With AI being pushed hard, what that will do is make it easier for studios to develop bad games for little money- and if it sells, great, if not, no loss. Gone are the days when studios actually depend on a high quality game to generate enough revenue to pay development costs plus a profit.

Just yesterday where the winds meet released wich us completely free 2 play and not pay to win aprently, and watch my whole guilds discord switched to this game lol.

Oh btw it has crossplay

ADarklore · November 15

fizzybeef wrote: »

ADarklore wrote: »

Well, with the death of New World... this just added more players to ESO's roster. There is little to no other MMOs coming out in the near future, and industry experts say that there is very little enthusiasm for ANY gaming company to develop another MMO. So what this means is, if you want to play an MMO, you'll be limited with your choices to pretty much what's available now. The future seems very bleak for any MMOs currently in development as well- with a few teetering on cancellation. The LOTR game is done... even though some say, "There hasn't been any official announcement"... but when the entire studio that was developing it is shut down... do they really need to announce it? In fact, one of the directors on the game stated, directly, that LOTR was cancelled... but apparently for some that's not 'official' enough.

Thus, the MMOs that are currently active are in a much better position. As the choices become more limited, it's going to force players to either play what's available, or don't play an MMO at all. I honestly fear for the future of gaming altogether. With AI being pushed hard, what that will do is make it easier for studios to develop bad games for little money- and if it sells, great, if not, no loss. Gone are the days when studios actually depend on a high quality game to generate enough revenue to pay development costs plus a profit.

Just yesterday where the winds meet released wich us completely free 2 play and not pay to win aprently, and watch my whole guilds discord switched to this game lol.

Oh btw it has crossplay

And we saw the same exact thing when New World came out, and within a month everyone had gone back to what they were playing before.

Overamera · November 15

ZOS_Kevin wrote: »

So crossplay is a priority. As we have noted, we are actively exploring everything that crossplay would touch. Because all of that is additional dev work. We cannot stress this enough, this is a massive undertaking that requires meticulous investigation to make sure we factor in every aspect of ESO. Additionally we will need to building in time to either build or overhaul systems to make sure it works with crossplay without causing a ton of issues. And for an 11 yr old game that didn't have crossplay in mind when it was being build (since crossplay was not an industry feature yet) we would rather take the time to do this right.

I can assure you, if this was a matter of just flipping some switches to get crossplay online, we would have done that a long time ago. We are just as eager to get crossplay online so that you can play with anyone regardless of platform choice. But the time we are taking for crossplay is needed.

Hello Kevin, I'd like to ask if crossplay even is possible? As ZOS has now started working on it and everything it would touch, I have yet seen someone from ZOS say it's actually something that is possible. Only that the game wasn't build for it. So now that you are working on this, have you actually seen that it is possible? Additionally will we get updates on this or timeline on when crossplay might come out?

ArchMikem · November 15

fizzybeef wrote: »

ArchMikem wrote: »

The game isnt empty, events just always draw most into specific areas.

The game is deffo empty on some servers.

And i agree that only crossplay will save the game

So you want constant crowds? Bosses mobbed down in seconds? People fighting over loot drops? Sorc Pets flooding player hubs?

edward_frigidhands · November 15

It should be.

Erickson9610 · November 16

ArchMikem wrote: »

fizzybeef wrote: »

ArchMikem wrote: »

The game isnt empty, events just always draw most into specific areas.

The game is deffo empty on some servers.

And i agree that only crossplay will save the game

So you want constant crowds? Bosses mobbed down in seconds? People fighting over loot drops? Sorc Pets flooding player hubs?

It's a Massively Multiplayer Online game.

Besides, there's already functionality in the game to split the population between instances so there's still a population cap for each instance.

fizzybeef · November 16

ArchMikem wrote: »

fizzybeef wrote: »

ArchMikem wrote: »

The game isnt empty, events just always draw most into specific areas.

The game is deffo empty on some servers.

And i agree that only crossplay will save the game

So you want constant crowds? Bosses mobbed down in seconds? People fighting over loot drops? Sorc Pets flooding player hubs?

So you want the game to shutdown because there are not enough players left who spend money?

Poss · November 16

ArchMikem wrote: »

So you want constant crowds? Bosses mobbed down in seconds? People fighting over loot drops? Sorc Pets flooding player hubs?

Yes!!! 100%

I’d kill to go back to peak ESO during Orsinium when people were everywhere. Like when One Tamriel dropped and we could finally see players from other alliances. Was a magical time

Anilahation · November 17

Ulvich wrote: »

Image having to change your name after 7 years because someone else has had it for 8. What would you do?

I wouldnt really worry since my name is unqiue to myself and i get it in every game i play.

if i didnt have it o well ill add an extra N

MISTFORMBZZZ · November 18

Poss wrote: »

ArchMikem wrote: »

So you want constant crowds? Bosses mobbed down in seconds? People fighting over loot drops? Sorc Pets flooding player hubs?

Yes!!! 100%

I’d kill to go back to peak ESO during Orsinium when people were everywhere. Like when One Tamriel dropped and we could finally see players from other alliances. Was a magical time

It really was but this time is so long over, its just sad

Anilahation · November 18

ADarklore wrote: »

fizzybeef wrote: »

ADarklore wrote: »

Well, with the death of New World... this just added more players to ESO's roster. There is little to no other MMOs coming out in the near future, and industry experts say that there is very little enthusiasm for ANY gaming company to develop another MMO. So what this means is, if you want to play an MMO, you'll be limited with your choices to pretty much what's available now. The future seems very bleak for any MMOs currently in development as well- with a few teetering on cancellation. The LOTR game is done... even though some say, "There hasn't been any official announcement"... but when the entire studio that was developing it is shut down... do they really need to announce it? In fact, one of the directors on the game stated, directly, that LOTR was cancelled... but apparently for some that's not 'official' enough.

Thus, the MMOs that are currently active are in a much better position. As the choices become more limited, it's going to force players to either play what's available, or don't play an MMO at all. I honestly fear for the future of gaming altogether. With AI being pushed hard, what that will do is make it easier for studios to develop bad games for little money- and if it sells, great, if not, no loss. Gone are the days when studios actually depend on a high quality game to generate enough revenue to pay development costs plus a profit.

Just yesterday where the winds meet released wich us completely free 2 play and not pay to win aprently, and watch my whole guilds discord switched to this game lol.

Oh btw it has crossplay

And we saw the same exact thing when New World came out, and within a month everyone had gone back to what they were playing before.

new world was only on PC.

I wont think the new eastern MMO will make a decent dent but I will say I have friends that play on xbox and PC, and we are simply playing crossplay games.

ESO doesn't have crossplay, other games do and this just deters us from playing ESO.

StihlReign · November 18

Microsoft is supporting and pushing the cross platform initiative with Bethesda, among others, in mind specifically. Since Microsoft sets the agenda, I'd recommend starting there if you're looking for timetables, the current strategy, framework and the agenda. There's a ton of recent news, some recent news on the forum here - Xbox president Sarah Bond has confirmed that Microsoft is now working on the next-generation Xbox console.

Here's some news you may have missed, another piece to a larger puzzle:

Microsoft’s PlayFab Service looks to take Game Saves Cross-Platform
PlayFab’s new Game Saves has just launched in public preview for interested developers, and aims to improve cross-save functionality – helping players to maintain a single point of progression when playing on multiple platforms. (Kinda fits in with Microsoft’s whole approach to gaming nowadays!) Initially supporting Xbox, Steam and Windows, players should be able to sync saves across the platforms.

Benefits of PlayFab Game Saves

Connects player progress to your game instead of individual devices or platforms so they can continue their journey any time from any device.
Eliminates the complexity of implementing cross-platform synchronization so you can focus on delivering great gameplay.
Supports online and offline play with control of transitions between those states.
Minimizes the chance of version conflicts by enabling flexible game save layout with clear dependency boundaries.
Helps players seamlessly transition between devices and platforms to maintain a consistent point-of-progression.
Provides contextual cues to assist players in making informed conflict-resolution and single-point-of-progression decisions, when needed.
Delivers geo-aware cloud storage and fast synchronization to improve performance and reliability.
Recovers players from bad state with support for version rollback (coming soon).
Works with Xbox-provided background uploader and title-callable UI, where available.

The team have stated that PlayFab Game Saves is currently in a ‘limited public preview’, and will not come with an additional cost to developers that are working within the Xbox Ecosystem.

Source1 MS Game Dev blog

fun times ahead

thejadefalcon · November 18

We've just watched an event they've been hyping up for a year come crashing down around them in a dozen different ways. No way is crossplay not going to brick people's accounts by mistake.

DenverRalphy · November 19

Anilahation wrote: »

ADarklore wrote: »

fizzybeef wrote: »

ADarklore wrote: »

Well, with the death of New World... this just added more players to ESO's roster. There is little to no other MMOs coming out in the near future, and industry experts say that there is very little enthusiasm for ANY gaming company to develop another MMO. So what this means is, if you want to play an MMO, you'll be limited with your choices to pretty much what's available now. The future seems very bleak for any MMOs currently in development as well- with a few teetering on cancellation. The LOTR game is done... even though some say, "There hasn't been any official announcement"... but when the entire studio that was developing it is shut down... do they really need to announce it? In fact, one of the directors on the game stated, directly, that LOTR was cancelled... but apparently for some that's not 'official' enough.

Thus, the MMOs that are currently active are in a much better position. As the choices become more limited, it's going to force players to either play what's available, or don't play an MMO at all. I honestly fear for the future of gaming altogether. With AI being pushed hard, what that will do is make it easier for studios to develop bad games for little money- and if it sells, great, if not, no loss. Gone are the days when studios actually depend on a high quality game to generate enough revenue to pay development costs plus a profit.

Just yesterday where the winds meet released wich us completely free 2 play and not pay to win aprently, and watch my whole guilds discord switched to this game lol.

Oh btw it has crossplay

And we saw the same exact thing when New World came out, and within a month everyone had gone back to what they were playing before.

new world was only on PC.

New World is on consoles too. Unless you mean when it first launched.

Dagoth_Rac · November 19

Erickson9610 wrote: »

Ulvich wrote: »

Image having to change your name after 7 years because someone else has had it for 8. What would you do?

That's simply not going to happen. The character data is still distinguished by which server and platform it's on.

"Adam (PC/NA)" is different from "Adam (PS/NA)" and "Adam (XB/NA)". The most intuitive solution is to place a symbol next to the name, just like how other games with crossplay manage it.

Another solution would be to allow duplicate character names in general — we already have account names as special identifiers. Any duplicate account names are then distinguished by their platform.

And then "Adam (PC/NA)" goes to his housing storage to get some gear, but sees "Adam (XB/NA)" items in there. And ... oops ... it is now all bound to "Adam (PC/NA)". Should that happen? No. But I have no idea how normalized ESO's databases are or how rigorous they are in maintaining primary and foreign keys. I am guessing there are a lot of places for data corruption to sneak in.

Erickson9610 · November 19

Dagoth_Rac wrote: »

Erickson9610 wrote: »

Ulvich wrote: »

Image having to change your name after 7 years because someone else has had it for 8. What would you do?

That's simply not going to happen. The character data is still distinguished by which server and platform it's on.

"Adam (PC/NA)" is different from "Adam (PS/NA)" and "Adam (XB/NA)". The most intuitive solution is to place a symbol next to the name, just like how other games with crossplay manage it.

Another solution would be to allow duplicate character names in general — we already have account names as special identifiers. Any duplicate account names are then distinguished by their platform.

And then "Adam (PC/NA)" goes to his housing storage to get some gear, but sees "Adam (XB/NA)" items in there. And ... oops ... it is now all bound to "Adam (PC/NA)". Should that happen? No. But I have no idea how normalized ESO's databases are or how rigorous they are in maintaining primary and foreign keys. I am guessing there are a lot of places for data corruption to sneak in.

The data for each platform/region is still separately maintained. If Xbox servers go down for maintenance while PC servers are still up, "Adam (PC/NA)" cannot visit "Adam (XB/NA)"'s house until the Xbox servers come back online. The associated data for all accounts on Xbox is stored separately from the data for accounts on PlayStation and for accounts on PC.

What Crossplay does not do is allow account merging. You cannot access your Xbox account from your PC account, or vice versa. If you made significant progress on Xbox and recently moved to PC, you have to start over again, as your PC account will not allow you to continue where you left off with your Xbox account.

The sole purpose of Crossplay is to allow PC, Xbox, and PlayStation accounts to play together — that means that, while you could trade items between accounts like you can already do on your platform/server, you cannot actually overwrite your account with someone else's. Visiting another person's house doesn't make it your house, because both your account and the homeowner's account are treated as two distinct accounts.

tomofhyrule · November 19

Erickson9610 wrote: »

Dagoth_Rac wrote: »

Erickson9610 wrote: »

Ulvich wrote: »

Image having to change your name after 7 years because someone else has had it for 8. What would you do?

That's simply not going to happen. The character data is still distinguished by which server and platform it's on.

"Adam (PC/NA)" is different from "Adam (PS/NA)" and "Adam (XB/NA)". The most intuitive solution is to place a symbol next to the name, just like how other games with crossplay manage it.

Another solution would be to allow duplicate character names in general — we already have account names as special identifiers. Any duplicate account names are then distinguished by their platform.

And then "Adam (PC/NA)" goes to his housing storage to get some gear, but sees "Adam (XB/NA)" items in there. And ... oops ... it is now all bound to "Adam (PC/NA)". Should that happen? No. But I have no idea how normalized ESO's databases are or how rigorous they are in maintaining primary and foreign keys. I am guessing there are a lot of places for data corruption to sneak in.

The data for each platform/region is still separately maintained. If Xbox servers go down for maintenance while PC servers are still up, "Adam (PC/NA)" cannot visit "Adam (XB/NA)"'s house until the Xbox servers come back online. The associated data for all accounts on Xbox is stored separately from the data for accounts on PlayStation and for accounts on PC.

What Crossplay does not do is allow account merging. You cannot access your Xbox account from your PC account, or vice versa. If you made significant progress on Xbox and recently moved to PC, you have to start over again, as your PC account will not allow you to continue where you left off with your Xbox account.

The sole purpose of Crossplay is to allow PC, Xbox, and PlayStation accounts to play together — that means that, while you could trade items between accounts like you can already do on your platform/server, you cannot actually overwrite your account with someone else's. Visiting another person's house doesn't make it your house, because both your account and the homeowner's account are treated as two distinct accounts.

That wasn't the point the previous poster was trying to make.

Obviously, the way you report it is how it should work. But can you guarantee - beyond the shadow of a doubt - that there is an absolute 0% chance of mixing the files ever happening? The way the servers are currently architectured would likely require a 'crossplay' server to be a merged PC/XB/PS megamegaserver, so that seems like a likely scenario if they go that route.

That's what people are scared of. Bugs making the entire capstone event of 2025 practically uncompleteable for a large percentage of the paying population are one thing, but if it ever came out that a player's characters/gear/stuff was deleted because of an accidental merge?

Erickson9610 · November 19

tomofhyrule wrote: »

Erickson9610 wrote: »

Dagoth_Rac wrote: »

Erickson9610 wrote: »

Ulvich wrote: »

Image having to change your name after 7 years because someone else has had it for 8. What would you do?

That's simply not going to happen. The character data is still distinguished by which server and platform it's on.

"Adam (PC/NA)" is different from "Adam (PS/NA)" and "Adam (XB/NA)". The most intuitive solution is to place a symbol next to the name, just like how other games with crossplay manage it.

Another solution would be to allow duplicate character names in general — we already have account names as special identifiers. Any duplicate account names are then distinguished by their platform.

And then "Adam (PC/NA)" goes to his housing storage to get some gear, but sees "Adam (XB/NA)" items in there. And ... oops ... it is now all bound to "Adam (PC/NA)". Should that happen? No. But I have no idea how normalized ESO's databases are or how rigorous they are in maintaining primary and foreign keys. I am guessing there are a lot of places for data corruption to sneak in.

The data for each platform/region is still separately maintained. If Xbox servers go down for maintenance while PC servers are still up, "Adam (PC/NA)" cannot visit "Adam (XB/NA)"'s house until the Xbox servers come back online. The associated data for all accounts on Xbox is stored separately from the data for accounts on PlayStation and for accounts on PC.

What Crossplay does not do is allow account merging. You cannot access your Xbox account from your PC account, or vice versa. If you made significant progress on Xbox and recently moved to PC, you have to start over again, as your PC account will not allow you to continue where you left off with your Xbox account.

The sole purpose of Crossplay is to allow PC, Xbox, and PlayStation accounts to play together — that means that, while you could trade items between accounts like you can already do on your platform/server, you cannot actually overwrite your account with someone else's. Visiting another person's house doesn't make it your house, because both your account and the homeowner's account are treated as two distinct accounts.

That wasn't the point the previous poster was trying to make.

Obviously, the way you report it is how it should work. But can you guarantee - beyond the shadow of a doubt - that there is an absolute 0% chance of mixing the files ever happening? The way the servers are currently architectured would likely require a 'crossplay' server to be a merged PC/XB/PS megamegaserver, so that seems like a likely scenario if they go that route.

That's what people are scared of. Bugs making the entire capstone event of 2025 practically uncompleteable for a large percentage of the paying population are one thing, but if it ever came out that a player's characters/gear/stuff was deleted because of an accidental merge?

Even if player data was accidentally overwritten, we know that it can be fixed. I mean, just look back at what happened when the PTS data was accidentally copied over into Live.

I can't say "beyond the shadow of a doubt" because I don't know firsthand how ZOS structures their game servers. I just gather that because these databases are separate — and ZOS most likely uses some form of data correction or backups to prevent permanent data loss — it all boils down to how ZOS implements Crossplay. We know ZOS is taking their time with this feature, so they are going to perform several tests as they develop it.

The idea of a unified server per region is interesting, but wouldn't that suggest that Crossplay wouldn't harm the data anyway? If the issue is that accounts could get their data overwritten due to some accounts having similar identifiers or names, then merging those databases safely would mean there'd be no chance of data being overwritten, as each unique account would still be uniquely identifiable. It's a very basic test to determine if the number of accounts is incorrect when adding the entries from each database together, and primary keys are unique.

What I think will happen is that each of the databases will remain separate, but each server will interface with one another. For instance, when a player on PC wants to trade items with a player on Xbox, the PC and Xbox servers need to communicate which items are being traded from/to which player on which server. You don't need the data to be stored in the same database, because with Crossplay, the servers can request data from databases other than their own.

Every part of the game that involves referencing a character or account (from item sets to Tales of Tribute to leaderboards and so on) would need to be updated to the new standards imposed by Crossplay.

tomofhyrule · November 19

Erickson9610 wrote: »

tomofhyrule wrote: »

Erickson9610 wrote: »

Dagoth_Rac wrote: »

Erickson9610 wrote: »

Ulvich wrote: »

Image having to change your name after 7 years because someone else has had it for 8. What would you do?

That's simply not going to happen. The character data is still distinguished by which server and platform it's on.

"Adam (PC/NA)" is different from "Adam (PS/NA)" and "Adam (XB/NA)". The most intuitive solution is to place a symbol next to the name, just like how other games with crossplay manage it.

Another solution would be to allow duplicate character names in general — we already have account names as special identifiers. Any duplicate account names are then distinguished by their platform.

And then "Adam (PC/NA)" goes to his housing storage to get some gear, but sees "Adam (XB/NA)" items in there. And ... oops ... it is now all bound to "Adam (PC/NA)". Should that happen? No. But I have no idea how normalized ESO's databases are or how rigorous they are in maintaining primary and foreign keys. I am guessing there are a lot of places for data corruption to sneak in.

The data for each platform/region is still separately maintained. If Xbox servers go down for maintenance while PC servers are still up, "Adam (PC/NA)" cannot visit "Adam (XB/NA)"'s house until the Xbox servers come back online. The associated data for all accounts on Xbox is stored separately from the data for accounts on PlayStation and for accounts on PC.

What Crossplay does not do is allow account merging. You cannot access your Xbox account from your PC account, or vice versa. If you made significant progress on Xbox and recently moved to PC, you have to start over again, as your PC account will not allow you to continue where you left off with your Xbox account.

The sole purpose of Crossplay is to allow PC, Xbox, and PlayStation accounts to play together — that means that, while you could trade items between accounts like you can already do on your platform/server, you cannot actually overwrite your account with someone else's. Visiting another person's house doesn't make it your house, because both your account and the homeowner's account are treated as two distinct accounts.

That wasn't the point the previous poster was trying to make.

Obviously, the way you report it is how it should work. But can you guarantee - beyond the shadow of a doubt - that there is an absolute 0% chance of mixing the files ever happening? The way the servers are currently architectured would likely require a 'crossplay' server to be a merged PC/XB/PS megamegaserver, so that seems like a likely scenario if they go that route.

That's what people are scared of. Bugs making the entire capstone event of 2025 practically uncompleteable for a large percentage of the paying population are one thing, but if it ever came out that a player's characters/gear/stuff was deleted because of an accidental merge?

Even if player data was accidentally overwritten, we know that it can be fixed. I mean, just look back at what happened when the PTS data was accidentally copied over into Live.

Frankly, I don't consider "we had a major issue that set off hundreds of alarm bells and destroyed trust with most of our unpaid testers because we temp-banned these people for 11 days while we detangled their accounts and we hope that we were able to literally buy back their trust so we can still have testers" as a vote of confidence. Are you seriously suggesting that most players will see their main get deleted and be like "oh, I suppose ZOS will fix it eventually, I'm not mad at all!"

None of us know how it will be implemented. As it is now, there is no way to transfer any information between characters unless they're on the same server, so the most likely scenario is a merged server, which would require all accounts and characters to have unique internal IDs and for them to be able to checksum all of that before it happens. Or, they could build a different way to transfer information (I had originally thought that Vengeance was going to be their answer to crossplay, since it is in effect a brand new character and you get all of the rewards afterward, so it in essence would make a new character on a new 'Vengeance' server).

Either way, we don't know how it will go.

But one thing is for certain: they have to get it right, the first time. If there is any bug with it, particularly if that bug involves someone's information getting accidentally overwritten because of an ID mismatch, people will drop this game and not look back. If we can't trust the integrity of the servers, there's no chance.

Erickson9610 · November 19

tomofhyrule wrote: »

Erickson9610 wrote: »

tomofhyrule wrote: »

Erickson9610 wrote: »

Dagoth_Rac wrote: »

Erickson9610 wrote: »

Ulvich wrote: »

Image having to change your name after 7 years because someone else has had it for 8. What would you do?

That's simply not going to happen. The character data is still distinguished by which server and platform it's on.

"Adam (PC/NA)" is different from "Adam (PS/NA)" and "Adam (XB/NA)". The most intuitive solution is to place a symbol next to the name, just like how other games with crossplay manage it.

Another solution would be to allow duplicate character names in general — we already have account names as special identifiers. Any duplicate account names are then distinguished by their platform.

And then "Adam (PC/NA)" goes to his housing storage to get some gear, but sees "Adam (XB/NA)" items in there. And ... oops ... it is now all bound to "Adam (PC/NA)". Should that happen? No. But I have no idea how normalized ESO's databases are or how rigorous they are in maintaining primary and foreign keys. I am guessing there are a lot of places for data corruption to sneak in.

The data for each platform/region is still separately maintained. If Xbox servers go down for maintenance while PC servers are still up, "Adam (PC/NA)" cannot visit "Adam (XB/NA)"'s house until the Xbox servers come back online. The associated data for all accounts on Xbox is stored separately from the data for accounts on PlayStation and for accounts on PC.

What Crossplay does not do is allow account merging. You cannot access your Xbox account from your PC account, or vice versa. If you made significant progress on Xbox and recently moved to PC, you have to start over again, as your PC account will not allow you to continue where you left off with your Xbox account.

The sole purpose of Crossplay is to allow PC, Xbox, and PlayStation accounts to play together — that means that, while you could trade items between accounts like you can already do on your platform/server, you cannot actually overwrite your account with someone else's. Visiting another person's house doesn't make it your house, because both your account and the homeowner's account are treated as two distinct accounts.

That wasn't the point the previous poster was trying to make.

Obviously, the way you report it is how it should work. But can you guarantee - beyond the shadow of a doubt - that there is an absolute 0% chance of mixing the files ever happening? The way the servers are currently architectured would likely require a 'crossplay' server to be a merged PC/XB/PS megamegaserver, so that seems like a likely scenario if they go that route.

That's what people are scared of. Bugs making the entire capstone event of 2025 practically uncompleteable for a large percentage of the paying population are one thing, but if it ever came out that a player's characters/gear/stuff was deleted because of an accidental merge?

Even if player data was accidentally overwritten, we know that it can be fixed. I mean, just look back at what happened when the PTS data was accidentally copied over into Live.

Frankly, I don't consider "we had a major issue that set off hundreds of alarm bells and destroyed trust with most of our unpaid testers because we temp-banned these people for 11 days while we detangled their accounts and we hope that we were able to literally buy back their trust so we can still have testers" as a vote of confidence. Are you seriously suggesting that most players will see their main get deleted and be like "oh, I suppose ZOS will fix it eventually, I'm not mad at all!"

None of us know how it will be implemented. As it is now, there is no way to transfer any information between characters unless they're on the same server, so the most likely scenario is a merged server, which would require all accounts and characters to have unique internal IDs and for them to be able to checksum all of that before it happens. Or, they could build a different way to transfer information (I had originally thought that Vengeance was going to be their answer to crossplay, since it is in effect a brand new character and you get all of the rewards afterward, so it in essence would make a new character on a new 'Vengeance' server).

Either way, we don't know how it will go.

But one thing is for certain: they have to get it right, the first time. If there is any bug with it, particularly if that bug involves someone's information getting accidentally overwritten because of an ID mismatch, people will drop this game and not look back. If we can't trust the integrity of the servers, there's no chance.

The point I was trying to make with that quoted text was that we've seen the worst happen, and know it can still be salvaged.

The three ways I see this feature being implemented — a separate "megamegaserver" separate from the existing servers (extremely unlikely), a combined server grouped by region (somewhat likely), or a new way for servers to interface with one another (most likely) — can all be done without causing irreparable damage.

Further, ZOS is taking their time with this, and they can always copy the data from any of the servers to perform tests with during their development time. If they find any issue with data corruption, they will fix it. Crossplay isn't a paid feature that has to be rushed to meet the release window of an expansion, after all.

There is a way to safely implement Crossplay, and they are taking the time they need. And in the worst case, the damage can be repaired. I don't see any reason to worry about Crossplay's implementation.

Yes, I know things would be very bad if they mess things up. I just don't see that happening for the reasons I've stated above, though. It's better to have Crossplay implemented when it's safe than it is to never risk implementing it.

AllenaNightWood · November 19

its possible that they get to the end and crossplay may not be viable for a game of its age and for those saying servers are drying up i dont see this when i get on i always see tons of people running around or chatting up zone chat it may be quieter at certain points of the day because ppl have lives but other parts of the day there is so many ppl on that its crazy