• Where Emulation is Heading

    Emulation, regardless of personal opinion, is changing.
    What varies from person to person is whether or not they feel this change is for the good, or the worse.
    A couple days ago I received some feedback of personal opinions on this topic, and I'll address those here as well as provide my own take on the situation.
    So, for my fourth blog post...
    The State of Emulation
    --
    Out of most of the feedback I received, my own thinking is most along the lines of Kirth's.
    It's been going down the hill for quite a while, that's for sure. Gaps between private projects keep increasing. Quite the trend has been that people attempted to fill that gap using drama as cement. Incidentally, it seems new patches seem to be supported faster and faster. We may well be heading back to the "new patch now, proper (feature) support later".
    -KIRTH
    Many people will argue that emulation is on an upswing, simply because patches are being supported faster and faster. However, with lack of proper feature support as well as some emulators being riddled with bugs every few revisions, is it really a step forward? Or a step backward?
    Private projects within themselves can be an argument for, as well as against, the improvement of emulation.
    While oftentimes private projects can create stellar levels of productivity as well as improvements, oftentimes these private projects are, well, private - no one else has access to these improvements. So if no one has access, are they really improvements to emulation at all? This is again, another variable that can be argued.
    imo, 3.1.3 held my dearest memories of WoW private servers. I don't get any enjoyment out of the game anymore, retail or private.
    -RUDYDIMACALI
    In Rudydimacali's opinion, Patch 3.1.3 of WoW had the best emulation. However, I am more personally inclined towards Terrorblade's take on the 'golden era' of emulation; TBC.

    I'm going to do this by emulator, Arcemu: ArcEmu is really being the drag down of WoW Emulation because it doesn't have very many contributors like other projects like mangos and trinitycore they both are way far ahead of them in feature support and they have less bugs so arcemu is bringing emulation down because people continue to use it only for there Lua engine and don't both contributing shit when they fix it. ManGOS: ManGOS hasn't always been as stable and bug free as it is now which shows that emulation is growing and people are contributing to it so it's a star for emulation. TrinityCore: A ManGOS branch originally has been a shining star since it's release in 08 which is bringing emulation up also. So overall if more people start contributing to projects emulation will stop being in the shithole and be great again like it was in tbc.
    -TERRORBLADE
    Terrorblade, while also providing his personal opinion on emulators on an individual basis, touched on the same point I mentioned above about private projects. "So overall if more people start contributing to projects emulation will stop being in the shithole"; A great majority of developers ARE contributing to projects - it's just the projects are not public. This could also be interpreted to the higher percentage of leechers that are around these days. This, however, is just my opinion - Kirth disagrees.
    I myself don't think that leeching is a growing trend. What I do see is the increase in protection against leeching: think Lua encoding. This also brings me to the grow of Lua as the main scripting language. More and more can be done using the language (mainly because of HyperSniper's doings). What does make me a happy person is the decrease in repacks. I'm hoping that we'll, one day, be completely be rid of their putrid stench.
    -KIRTH
    Lua encoding is one of the newly inspired trends that is coming to emulation. Lua within itself is being seen as both a hindrance and an improvement to emulation. Many new up and coming developers have chosen to learn Lua over C++ - and while this allows them to grasp a coding language often sooner and easier than C++, it limits them in a variety of ways. For one, Antrix-spawned cores are still the only ones that REALLY support Lua (although some users have taken to adding somewhat shotty Lua support to other cores, such as Mangos); whereas learning C++ would be a cross-core, and truly multi-purpose coding language.
    But then again, Lua has it's other benefits too; it supports easy reloading of scripts, which for casual emulator scripting can really speed up the process - no need to recompile the entire core just to fix a small minor error. As well, users like HyperSniper have been vastly improving the Lua engine over the recent while, which has again pushed for it's recent dominance as the first acquired scripting language.
    Kirth also touches on the decreasing of repacks - this is something I have noticed as well. Now, Kirth has, an obvious resentment towards these "putrid" repacks, however for many, repacks can be the first easy and cautious step into emulation.
    While personally I don't believe repacks should ever be COMPLETELY abolished, they shouldn't completely overtake emulation like they have in the past either.

    --
    Thanks for reading my blog,
    More will be coming soon!
    Leave any comments or feedback on this, or other topics, in the comments below!
    -HG
    This article was originally published in blog: Where Emulation is Heading started by Hellgawd
    Comments 20 Comments
    1. Glynbeard's Avatar
      Glynbeard -
      Promoted to front page.

      I found the contrasting views in this post very interesting to read and have thus posted it onto the front page.

      I suggest reading the comments from the original blog post as well-they are just as interesting.
    1. XTZGZoReX's Avatar
      XTZGZoReX -
      I see no mention of WCell; what a shame.
    1. rudydimacali's Avatar
      rudydimacali -
      Aye! I got quoted! lol, well yeah, I liked the pvp in 3.1.3. TBC was awesome too.

      I don't know if any of you played Exigence WoW in 2.4.3.... It was heaven.
    1. Kaiservolk3's Avatar
      Kaiservolk3 -
      i used to play on one called wowreborn (TBC, before lk came out) and it was amazing.
    1. danielrhodea's Avatar
      danielrhodea -
      I think emulation has always been very "clicky" where only certain types of activity have been deemed "appropriate".

      Don't believe me? I have posted working java code on this forum and had virtually no thanks and been labelled a leecher whilst some people post horrible edits that look like the work of a five year old and have a good reputation. Also certain active members of the modding community act like they are the best thing since sliced bread and make no attempt to help others.

      This is the legacy that "clicky" interest groups have unfortunately in 10years time nobody will remember noggit or any of the much dwindled wow modding community, maybe I'm wrong but thats just my two cents
    1. Harambeqt's Avatar
      Harambeqt -
      Vanilia = Well, Emulation started to grew not much to say pretty shitty from time to time.
      TBC = The Golden era of emulation
      WoTLK = Emulation is going down, down and more down.
      CATA = What's going to happend there? I have no fkn idea
    1. bestestNameEvar's Avatar
      bestestNameEvar -
      I agree. WoTLK Private servers seem to be...
      A: All the same.
      and
      B: Uncreative.

      I remember the good 'ol TBC funservers...
      Some I happened to drift by, had really fun, custom, awesome events. Something the average joe couldn't make.
      I thought those servers were really something special, but nowadays...
    1. Dombo's Avatar
      Dombo -
      Quote Originally Posted by AfterDawn View Post
      Vanilia = Well, Emulation started to grew not much to say pretty shitty from time to time.
      TBC = The Golden era of emulation
      WoTLK = Emulation is going down, down and more down.
      CATA = What's going to happend there? I have no fkn idea
      This sums it up


    1. psychobandit's Avatar
      psychobandit -
      Well I've never tried Mangos, But I have been working with Ascent based EMU's since way back in Antrix times (ie, before ascent) which eventually led me to ArcEMU. Which, at the time I started with it, was the most supported of the ascent based EMUs. I think these 2 comments sum up what I have learned since I've been involved with Arc: "ArcEmu is really being the drag down of WoW Emulation because it doesn't have very many contributors" And a very large reason for that is this next comment: "certain active members of the modding community act like they are the best thing since sliced bread"!
      I could add quite a bit to those, but I won't because I believe they sum it up nicely

      *edit. I will add I have only recently switched to Trinity & of the little I've seen, it is way more advanced/stable/etc. I have also noticed a better attitude toward its community.
    1. Ramsus543's Avatar
      Ramsus543 -
      Honestly I think emulation is really going to hit a standstill when cataclysm releases, bliz is using a new aspect to phasing called "terrain phasing" or some other kind of bs where the terrain itself will morph after you've done certain quests or something like that. I have a feeling wotlk is going to be the last real emulation we'll see for a couple years. Bliz is doing everything they can to make sure people have to pay to play the new expansion.

      Honestly? I could care less, I'm not paying 15 bucks a month to play a game I'd already spend 100 bucks to pay for in the first place, it's not worth it.

      But in my opinion TrinityCore probably has the best emulation going so far, the mods are awesome, devs are great (I'm not one of them I've just recently started contributing codewise) And plus they have a wiki that helps you get started compiling your first server, AND it has a description of all of the databases and most of the fields in them and what they do so you don't have to go looking around and say "uhh...ok so what does this field do again?"

      But like I said, once cataclysm hits, we will have a MAJOR standstill for a while, rushing to get cataclysm support just isn't going to work.
    1. I Hypnotoad I's Avatar
      I Hypnotoad I -
      Quote Originally Posted by Ramsus543 View Post
      Honestly I think emulation is really going to hit a standstill when cataclysm releases, bliz is using a new aspect to phasing called "terrain phasing" or some other kind of bs where the terrain itself will morph after you've done certain quests or something like that. I have a feeling wotlk is going to be the last real emulation we'll see for a couple years. Bliz is doing everything they can to make sure people have to pay to play the new expansion.

      Honestly? I could care less, I'm not paying 15 bucks a month to play a game I'd already spend 100 bucks to pay for in the first place, it's not worth it.

      But in my opinion TrinityCore probably has the best emulation going so far, the mods are awesome, devs are great (I'm not one of them I've just recently started contributing codewise) And plus they have a wiki that helps you get started compiling your first server, AND it has a description of all of the databases and most of the fields in them and what they do so you don't have to go looking around and say "uhh...ok so what does this field do again?"

      But like I said, once cataclysm hits, we will have a MAJOR standstill for a while, rushing to get cataclysm support just isn't going to work.
      Modeleditfag here. 'Terrain phasing' is an overhyped version of phasing.
      It's just a modified map on different map files. (EG: LostIsles1 = '706', LostIsles2 '707')
      They will combine this with the regular phasing you see now.
    1. JUNTOR's Avatar
      JUNTOR -
      Wtb WoWfusion back! It was the best server hands down. I never actually found out why it got shut down.
    1. darkwiz787's Avatar
      darkwiz787 -
      Erm, some cores (Thetruecrows Sandshroud has a branch) already support 4.0.0.
    1. Moaradin's Avatar
      Moaradin -
      TBC was definitely the golden age of emulation. It was actually the time I had more fun playing private servers than I did playing retail. Retail TBC was not very fun for me, but all the servers like Battlescape(if anyone remembers that) was very fun in BC.
    1. WiePasta's Avatar
      WiePasta -
      Well if you look at trinity core at its current state its pretty mutch bug free when it comes to talents and spells. So trinity core is way superior to mangos and arcemu in WOTLK.
    1. ZxOxZ21's Avatar
      ZxOxZ21 -
      Does anyone here remember SinWorld 2.4.3 Funserver? Yes, it was great, and I was Developer there. <3

      Thanks,
      ZxOxZ.
    1. Baltazarz's Avatar
      Baltazarz -
      You should see how much Arcemu has updated and fixed in the last three weeks. Those guys are working really fast.
    1. Ballwinkle's Avatar
      Ballwinkle -
      But, they are loosing features?
      What they had of clustering.
      What they had of vehicles, instead of updating.

      They only do fixes and don't write new code.
    1. earthful's Avatar
      earthful -
      I remember all of the great TBC servers, all of them had great balanced environments with very few bugs/problems. But when WoTLK hit, 7 of my favorite private servers went downhill or shut down. I've lost my interest in the private server community due to constant updating from Blizzard. Starcraft II is also coming in two days which also made me lose interest even further.

      Hopefully in few months the private servers will be back into their golden days, and I'll be back helping the servers develop once again.
    1. pakenyvhdg's Avatar
      pakenyvhdg -
      **àçíèöà â îòíîøåíèè ê ñåêñó ó ìóæ÷èí è æåíùèí âîñïðèíèìàåòñÿ áóäòî äîëæíîå. Ñ÷èòàåòñÿ, êîòîðûé ìóæ÷èíû áåçâûåçäíî ýðà äóìàþò î ñåêñå, íå ïðîïóñêàþò íè îäíîé þáêè è ñêëîííû ê ïîëèãàìèè. Æåíùèíàì òîëêè ïðèïèñûâàåò îõîòó ðàäè ìóæñêèìè êîøåëüêàìè, ñêëîííîñòü ê äîëãîâðåìåííûì è íàäåæíûì îòíîøåíèÿì è íåñïîñîáíîñòü íåîäíîêðàòíî ïîçíàâàòü îðãàçì.

      Ïñèõîëîãè ïðîâåëè îáñòîÿòåëüíîå èñïûòàíèå äëÿ òåìó òîãî, íàñêîëüêî ýòè ñòåðåîòèïû ñîîòâåòñòâóþò äåéñòâèòåëüíîñòè. Ïî ðåçóëüòàòàì ìíîãî÷èñëåííûõ îïðîñîâ, ïðîâîäèâøèõñÿ, â îñíîâíîì, ìåæäó ñòóäåíòîâ, à òàêæå àíàëèçà ðàíåå îïóáëèêîâàííûõ ðàáîò äëÿ ýòó òåìó, èññëåäîâàòåëüñêàÿ îáùåñòâî èç Ìè÷èãàíñêîãî óíèâåðñèòåòà îáíàðîäîâàëà ïîäðîáíûé èòîãîâûé îáçîð. Òåððè Êîíëè è åå êîëëåãè óòâåðæäàþò, êîòîðûé èçâåñòèå ê ñåêñó âîñïðåùàåòñÿ òàê ïðîñòî ðàçäåëèòü íà áåëîå/÷åðíîå èëè ðîçîâîå/ãîëóáîå, ïèøåò Livescience. Îíè ïðèøëè ê âûâîäó, ñêîëüêî øåñòü ðàñõîæèõ ãåíäåðíûõ ñòåðåîòèïîâ î ñåêñå — íå áîëåå ÷åì ñîöèàëüíûå ìèôû.
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