Idea] A PRACTICAL method to have multiple PCs in one game?

[ArtMurder]

I've heard some talk over this subject some here lately, and I thought it sounded like a cool, but all around crazy impossible idea (like skynet) But then, today I was working with SkyProc Patchers when it hit me, EXACTLY what needs to happen for this mod to work! Start off by having each character in individual save files, and every time you stop playing as one character, you save, exit the game, run a Dynamic Patcher, and select the save games you want to 'overlap', and create a dynamic ESP, making all the changes to the game your other character(s) has, and making an NPC of that character(s) in the location you saved them at. When creating this 'dynamic patch', you select which character you want to play as next, and that character is 'omitted' from the patch, but all other characters are included, so if you have a team of 4-5 players you can freely swap between them! You can have yourself as a follower, because when you re run the patch, if the character your switching to has been moved in the current patch, the esp now moves your location to were he was in the other characters save. Also, if you start the thieves guild quest, for example, in one character, it will disable that questline for other characters that 'overlap'. However, mini-quests can still be started if another character has started them, but when you swap characters if a mini-quest was completed by another one of your characters and the character you just changed to had that quest active, the esp will make it 'fail' the second you load up the save!

 

It's a bit more complicated then I'd like, but you still just have to exit the game, run 1 program, launch the game again - much simpler then any other method I've heard of! The patch.esp would have the same name at all times, so need to reactivate, or change load order.

 

I honestly have no clue how to create this kind of program, or how to make a program read a save file so if you like the sound of this, simply assist me! You can show me relevant tutorials, give me permission to work with something similar you've created, or you can just join the 'mod team' and contribute directly. I can NOT achieve this mod without help, but with help, I could create one of the most desired-yet-unachieved mods for skyrim!

[ArtMurder]

No one wants to help with this? I really have no idea how to create .jars at all, so I don't even no where to begin...

[bben46]

The game engine is just not suited to any kind of multiplayer or co op play - it was never intended to do that. There have been several attempts for co op play using the Gambryo engine - after nearly 2 years of work by some very talented people, They kinda sorta had a co op game. The demo I saw had a couple of naked PCs wandering around in a bare world but unable to really interact with each other - and lots of crashing. Moving the PC around takes up the largest portion of the processing power - moving two of them doesn't just double the processing power needed, it increases it even more - as now each PC must always be aware of the other one. If one wanders out of the field of view, it has to have a way to do something like a split screen or multi monitor. Which means more graphics rendering capability slowing everything down even more.

 

To get this to work you will have to completely remake the entire game on a different game engine - one that does support co op. And that would take a full studio about 3 to 5 years of work.

 

There is a Elder Scrolls on line in the works from Bethsoft though - It will not be exactly the same game as Skyrim though.

[ArtMurder]

The game engine is just not suited to any kind of multiplayer or co op play - it was never intended to do that. There have been several attempts for co op play using the Gambryo engine - after nearly 2 years of work by some very talented people, They kinda sorta had a co op game. The demo I saw had a couple of naked PCs wandering around in a bare world but unable to really interact with each other - and lots of crashing. Moving the PC around takes up the largest portion of the processing power - moving two of them doesn't just double the processing power needed, it increases it even more - as now each PC must always be aware of the other one. If one wanders out of the field of view, it has to have a way to do something like a split screen or multi monitor. Which means more graphics rendering capability slowing everything down even more.

 

To get this to work you will have to completely remake the entire game on a different game engine - one that does support co op. And that would take a full studio about 3 to 5 years of work.

 

There is a Elder Scrolls on line in the works from Bethsoft though - It will not be exactly the same game as Skyrim though.

I am not talking about multiplayer or co-op in any way. By 'multiple PCs', I mean, 'multiple Player Characters' as in multiple characters created by a player(but just ONE player), this would be a 'patch' that works kind of like ASIS, only instead of reading other mods and making a patch for them, it reads a SAVE FILE, and makes an ESP matching the changes to the game made by the character in that save file. For example, you play Character 1 for a while, start the thieves guild quest, and kill Bori in Riften. Now you run the patch, start Character 2, and their is an NPC in Riften, who is an exact match of Character 1 in your other save game, Bori is now dead, and you can not join the thieves guild. But you can however, have Character 1 as a follower for character 2, and visa-versa.

 

It's really just a 'dynamic' .esp file, creating an NPC that mimics the PC from another save file, and makes the changes to the world he has made. Yes, I know it's potentially a very complicated idea, but I don't see any reason why it's not possible, unless 'reading' a save file is more complicated then I am thinking.

 

I can see where you mistook my thread for being about multiplayer now that I look at the title again, but it's really trying to solve the "Play as multiple characters in the same game" mod problem, nor the "Multiple people playing in the same game" problem. I honestly completely agree with you there, I think the idea of a multiplayer skyrim is just hopeless.