Hi! new player here, got about 135 hours in over the last 2 weeks, great game! Also long time PoE, Grim Dawn, and Torchlight player, big fan of the genre.
One piece of feedback is that the flow of the game is very nice when you’re in a map while leveling or doing echoes, but this flow is constantly being broken up by loading screens in between maps.
My question is, are there any plans to introduce some sort of predictive loading, perhaps in the background, such that transitioning between areas is more seamless and keeps the player in the action? I’m not talking about preloading everything, that would be hard to do while leveling because I understand this will be an online title very soon, so server resources are required here. I’m more talking about some of the low hanging fruit.
Some low hanging fruit examples:
- if you’re starting a new character and you enter the first map, it’s almost guaranteed that the next map will be entered afterwards, since it is linear. Can this be preloaded to some extent to reduce the loading times when the player reaches its entrance?
- if you’re stepping into a time rift, there is not only the time travel animation, there is also that classic loading screen right after. perhaps the map can be loaded during the animation? (if it is not already)
- if you’re playing through an echo during monolith content, it’s almost guaranteed that the player will return to that intermediary end of time island. Can this be kept in memory during the echo run since that map is small? Or server-side, can this instance be created and kept alive for a certain time, since the map can likely be finished quickly?
depending on available server resources and risk tolerance, a medium hanging fruit example:
- if you are leveling a character and you have just accepted a mandatory main storyline quest, can some of the map assets be loaded in the background in the likely scenario the player will in that direction?
Even if it is not guaranteed a player will utilize that preloading, you guys probably have good data indicating where players go and what maps they enter afterwards, so choosing which maps get preloaded in the background at what points becomes more of a science.
Preloading and pre-instancing, even on a small scale applied only to the most guaranteed map flows and the most popular use cases, could make a huge different for the player’s experience. It could make this game feel smooth, more fun, and potentially make people happier with the current character levelling experience given that there is no alternative to playing the main campaign. food for thought!
Thanks 