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Joe Ybarra: One of the things we have actively discussed now from the beginning of preproduction is whether it will be possible for a player to play the game all the way to a maximum level cap without ever engaging in combat whatsoever. So we are certainly make a serious effort to see if we can create play activities and an enjoyable game experience in which that would be possible. That being said, we also know that if you look at the TV show that Michael Shanks, Daniel Jackson has a gun and he uses it from time to time but that is not his role in the show. So we would certainly expect the players would be able to assume that type of a role and responsibility in their game play.
But the real point I want to make here is that we are really emphasizing non-combat game play here because we recognize that many of our customers and potential customers that may not want to spend a lot of their time doing combat and do enjoy the idea of exploration and crafting, construction, engineering and all kinds of other things. So we really want to make sure that play experience is very rich and varied for those people.
Craig Dalrymple: Thank you. I have a question about the diplomat (inaudible) or arts type. I don't remember seeing this before in an online game. Is the intent behind that someone who is going to interact with MPC factions for perhaps your guild? Or will they serve as a liaison between live factions and other players? What's the idea there?
Joe Ybarra: We expect that they will do both. There is an underpinning to our design and our technology that is hard for me to describe this without getting into the details. But the idea is that there are MPC groups that are out there that can be influenced and various different…how can I explain myself here. It is possible that you could negotiate with say a village or a town on a planet and using your diplomat to get favors from that particular entity. This is one of the major things we want to use that particular class of player character for. Again, without getting into details it is really hard for me to describe exactly how that would work but this is an area that we have also invested a fair amount of time on.
Craig Dalrymple: On your trading system and free economy that people can participate in, is this to the point where traders will be able to work with say engineers and build that mine and refine that material and actually load it up on the ship, pilot it to another part of the galaxy or go through a gate to another area in the universe and trade it off for the optimal pricing? Is it going to be like that where the players really get to play a live market? Or is it intended to be played (inaudible)…
Joe Ybarra: I think we are going to have both. The player to player is going to be the big one because of the nature of the way we are designing the technology tree and the crafting construction system. The ability to build high-level unique things is going to be very interesting because it will be hard for everybody to be really good at everything so we will expect (inaudible) will specialize in particular things say for example they will be really good at Asgard technology and will be able to create materials that are specific to that tech tree.
But on the other side of the coin, you already described a play mechanic that we also support, which is the idea of free trade between MPC worlds, if you will. So we will want to make sure we have that too.
Craig Dalrymple: Cool. On your website about the game you refer to Shader Model 3.0's ability to function with (inaudible) machines. Since you know a bit about the game engine you are going to use, do you know already your benchmark for the bottom (Inaudible) the cutoff for computers?
Joe Ybarra: Not really yet because we really won't know that until we can test under load. It is more than just (inaudible) technology it is also how it performs in the client server environment.
Craig Dalrymple: Here's a real zinger I found searching around the Net. What everybody else had to say about the game. I found the screen shot actually hosted on Team X-Box.com. I haven't seen anything else indicating it might come out on the 360. Do they have it (inaudible) like that? Is that your actual design intent? (Inaudible) platform?
Joe Ybarra: Could you repeat the question please?
Craig Dalrymple: In researching and searching out what people have already discovered about the game I found that the Website teamXbox.com has information on Stargate Worlds up as a 360 release in the future.
Joe Ybarra: No kidding? I didn't know that.
Craig Dalrymple: Yes. So that would be a surprise to you guys then? And that's not (inaudible)
Joe Ybarra: Oh, I have to go and check that out.
Craig Dalrymple: I can send you the link if you'd like.
Joe Ybarra: Oh, I'd love that. Yes, if you would I would appreciate it.
Craig Dalrymple: Certainly. Then I will go back to combat. A lot of the (inaudible) options you have already indicated that it is going to be character ability skills based so it won't be like an SPS*. How will using…you know you described a very interesting mix of tactics using (inaudible) and everything else. If I am hiding behind a tree will that cause object collision? Or is that going to be a plan that will modify just a lot of chances of me being hit?
Joe Ybarra: There are actually about two or three other things that it will affect as well. This is the area of the design that we have invested a fair amount of effort on to the extent that we have actually started…we have a couple of prototypes that we have already built that allow us to understand how cover works with in particular AI and how it affects movement and various other components. So I guess there are two things that I am addressing.
One is that hiding behind a tree…the tree does provide hard cover. But the other side of it is that it also provides a modifier of a two hit number as well as perhaps the damage done. We are picking on a tree because there are things like (inaudible) and shields and other things. So the properties and the characteristics of how cover works in this game is very dynamic to the point where we have to have several different variables in order to model that correctly.
Craig Dalrymple: Last question for (inaudible) combat would be you already intend to support vehicles. Will there be vehicle involvement in combat? Or would they merely be a motor transport?
Joe Ybarra: We don't know the answer to that question yet because part of the issue with supporting vehicles as combat things is that we have to start modeling (inaudible) physics in the vehicle simulation. That is where we are in our pioneering work on the tech base right now for the game as a whole. We know we want to do it. The question is how robust can we make it.
Craig Dalrymple: Very good. That would be awesome. (Inaudible)… thank you very much. I appreciate the time to ask the questions. I am looking forward to your game.
Joe Ybarra: Thank you.
Operator: Our next question comes from Jaina Mistry from SG1-atlantis.com. Please go ahead.
Jaina Mistry: Hi. I have a couple of questions from over the pond actually. I was wondering if there is going to be a beta version available for this obviously very, very far in the future at the moment. Will there be?
Joe Ybarra: Absolutely.
Jaina Mistry: Who will be able to test this out?
Joe Ybarra: Well, we will do the normal procedure of having a close beta and we will start gathering names for people that will want to be part of that process probably right after we launch the community site. Then at some point during the beta cycle here we will have the traditional open beta where we will allow anybody to come in and play the game and of course this will all be a part of the stability as well as the content material that we will be putting into the game so you can look forward to this being a very normal or standard industry practice here in terms of our beta cycle.
Jaina Mistry: Also, about the guild…will there be any interactivity between guilds say forming alliances between the guild themselves instead of just players and characters in the game?
Joe Ybarra: Absolutely. We really want to encourage that big time because we believe that in order for some of the play activities to take place in this game that the guilds may have to get really big in terms of greater than 500 people playing in the guild. That is part of our design architecture for the guild's progression system here is that for example if you want to build a Goa'uld mother ship that the amount of resources and manpower required to do something like that will be fairly substantial. To do that it may in fact require the efforts of several guilds working together to accomplish that feat.
Jaina Mistry: Thanks very much.
Joe Ybarra: Sure. Thank you.
Operator: Our next question comes from Mike Thies from WOOT Radio. Please go ahead.
Mike Thies: Thanks (inaudible)…couple more questions here. One of the things that seems to be a growing trend in MMOs is a lack of death penalty. Have you folks decided anything as to how player death is going to work in the game?
Joe Ybarra: Yes, we support lack of death penalty. We don't want to penalize our customers too much. I think for us it is the other way around. Everything that we do is focusing in on positive feedback and rewards for the customer. If you make a mistake or you get killed by the mortar we don't want to punish you unduly for that.
Mike Thies: Another part of the death penalty system that has been hotly discussed…I have seen on several forum sites is how is it going to work for a dead player to end up back at their (inaudible). Is there going to be some sort of teleport system or is it just going to be poof you (inaudible).
Joe Ybarra: One of the concepts we have been discussions for months now is the idea that a squad or player is going to have a thread and the thread is the field remote expeditionary device that you will see in many of the TV shows where the SG team is going to a planet they have never been to and it is sort of this remote control robotic device that essentially is a carrier. It carries all their gear so what we thought about as far as what the FRED represents in our game is the idea that the FRED represents one of the ways that you transport material so it is sort of an extension of your backpack.
At the same time they also want to use it for your respond point so the idea is that the FRED became an important characteristic of game play in addition to just being a big bag (inaudible)… You want to make sure that you place it in a position where it is relatively safe; if you get killed you get (inaudible) in a spot that is not unreasonable. Some of our players…we have actually held a focus group on this product and they commented on the fact that using the FRED as a target in PVP and other things is a very interesting play mechanic and we say we hadn't even thought about that but you're right. So I guess we are addressing several things at one time here by utilizing the FRED as a responder
Mike Thies: Very interesting. My other concept that I wanted to talk about was some voice chat. Is that something that you are going to be looking at integrating? A lot of new MMOs are doing that. Are you going to look at that? Or are you going to leave voice chat to players finding their own method for doing that sort of thing?
Joe Ybarra: Well, we would sure like to support it. There are several issues associated with supporting voice chat. One of the ones in particular that I would like to comment on is the fact that we want to provide our customers with a safe environment to play in and that one of the issues that all MMOs have to confront is the fact that there are some players out there that don't use the services for the intended purpose it was built for. So the problem we have in supporting a voiceover IP type environment is that it is very difficult if not impossible for us to log any of that activity. But if somebody has a complaint or has an issue with what he is hearing…I mean there is nothing that we can really do to basically reinforce whether or not that happened or not or keep track of that so there is an issue there.
So the point I guess I want to make here is that from a technological standpoint it is reasonably straightforward for us to support this feature. From usability and a protecting our customers and making sure that we have a good environment to play in, that is a little bit trickier.
Mike Thies: My final question would be…I represent an online radio station geared for gamers and I have always paid close attention to board threads where they are talking about music and what they listen to during the game and a lot of players turn off the game sounds and listen to either their own music or a station (inaudible) radio. Are you going to supplement some sort of built-in method to the game so people can actually have an in game player so they can listen to whatever they want to instead of having to use something outside the game to tune into things like online radio stations or their own MP3 collections?
Joe Ybarra: We will probably have some sort of facility that allows the users to have unique music. It is hard for me to really comment on that because first of all I will say technologically speaking this is not difficult to do. So for us to support it would be straightforward. Again, we have issues about the user interface and making sure that the environment is stable and that type of thing but we can support that.
On the other side of the coin though we want to have our environment be atmospheric and be compelling enough that hopefully the users will want to listen to the music. We certainly will have to listen to the (inaudible) effects so we will have to be careful about this one.
Mike Thies: Okay. That is all I have. Thank you.
Joe Ybarra: Sure. Thank you.
Operator: Thank you. Our next question comes from Laura Griffin from stargate-game.com.
Laura Griffin: Hello again. First I want to tell you the (inaudible)…the thing that (inaudible) to Stargate when they go into a planet.
Joe Ybarra: There are two different things. Yes, the MALP* is a different device. The MALP* is the one they send through when they have never been there and they want to know if there is air on the other side.
Laura Griffin: Oh, I thought they always called it a MALP* for some reason.
Joe Ybarra: Yes. Well, when I found about the existence of the FRED I was confused on that point as well but I got straightened out after I watched a whole bunch of shows.
Laura Griffin: Okay, I was going to say, because according to the forums your (inaudible) are a little behind on what the season…
Joe Ybarra: Yes, that is me.
Laura Griffin: Oh, that is you?
Joe Ybarra: I approve the shows.
Laura Griffin: Okay, and what is your excuse for not being at Season 9?
Joe Ybarra: I am getting there real fast (chuckling).
Laura Griffin: A couple more I came up with real quick. After nine seasons and the fans have been begging for games, MGM has been shutting MODS* down for the last two years basically since Alliance started, what was your guys motivation start MMO for the fans? Obviously to make money but what was the other motivation to actually get it going finally?
Joe Ybarra: I don't know what the right way to answer that question is because the motivation was always there, as Tim indicated at the beginning of this call in that our original founders had a vision for billing this product as early as about 2-1/2 years ago. It has really been a case of during that 2-1/2 year period of time we have been trying to put together the right financing and the right team of people to actually build the product. But basically this product is being borne out of two completely synergistic but different forms of love, if you will. One is the love of Stargate and the material and what that whole IT is all about. The second is the love for building MMOs and building really amazing games in this genre. So those two being put together is really driving our motivation here in building this product.
Laura Griffin: Okay. Another one is this game going to be completely 100% online or is there going to be any offline content?
Joe Ybarra: Tough question to answer. Right now everything we are designing is online.
Tim Jenson: Let me add one more thing to that. I believe based upon our license arrangement with MGM right now all we can have is online content.
Laura Griffin: Okay, because I was going to say I travel a lot in Sydney airports and sometimes I cannot get a line. Someone brought up the graphics on the game -- your engine. One of the things I guess they are going to help out is what game style out there now that (inaudible)…graphic representation are you guys hitting for? I mean something like…I don't know to explain it…like on one of the new Dungeons and Dragons games what type of graphics are you shooting for?
Joe Ybarra: Our original design concept was to try to do something that was near photorealistic. Where we are going with our overall look and feel is that we need to back off of photorealism by a notch or two and of course this is really hard to describe over the telephone. It is a whole lot easier to just show you pictures of this. As we have our treatments completed we are going to be posting them to the Web site or on our community site so eventually you will be able to see exactly the look and feel that we are striking to get at.
It is going to be very interesting for us to do that because one of the things that I believe at least about science fiction is that in order to sell the science fiction it has to look pretty real. By the same token if we make it look too real we run into all kinds of problems from a technological standpoint as well as an art standpoint. So we know that we have to be one notch removed from that. But some of the artwork now that we are getting in our art department is pretty spectacular. So I am looking forward to getting them up there so that everybody can see it.
Laura Griffin: Okay, so you guys are shooting more towards the high-end PCs and not doing what some of the older companies are doing in keeping it with (Inaudible)?
Joe Ybarra: We are going to try to get to the largest population of hardware that we can but at the same token we also want to make sure that the product is visually stunning.
Laura Griffin: Okay, I haven't played (inaudible) in a while so people can shoot me if this is a dumb question but I have played American (inaudible) for many years loved military games. One of my favorite episodes is when Janet died. I was curious if there are going to be any consequences within a game -- life and death? Are you going to be able to actually lose your character? I played (inaudible)…for a while and if you die you just get sent back?
Joe Ybarra: We had a discussion earlier about using the FRED as a responder. Beyond that in terms of death penalties or ways that we will handle death I think a lot of that will come out of play test and what we find works best for the customers. But no, it is not our intention at this point to punish the customer at all.
Laura Griffin: So there won't be any consequences for Rambos and stuff like that?
Joe Ybarra: Maybe. But (inaudible)…more than it is about of design methodology we are pursuing right now.
Laura Griffin: Okay, because to me it started a team based type thing and that helps eliminate the Rambo files in game playing.
Joe Ybarra: Yes, it minimizes but does not eliminate. We will find that out as we get into play test.
Laura Griffin: Okay. Well, that was it for now.
Joe Ybarra: Very good. Thank you.
Laura Griffin: All right thanks.
Operator: Thank you. Once again if there are any questions please press star then "1" on your touchtone phone.
Tim Jenson: Operator?
Operator: Yes?
Tim Jenson: This is Tim Jenson. We will have time for one more question.
Operator: Okay, one more. All right, standing by for questions. We have one more question from Bart Fiddler from GamerGod.com. Please go ahead.
Bart Fiddler: Thanks again for the chance to ask another question here. One of the things that I haven't heard discussed was specific missions and/or quests. As we travel into the Stargate to an unknown world are we going to be faced with basically open-ended series of rewards for the discoveries or the things we find on the planet? Or before we actually enter into the Stargate will we be given a specific mission or quest?
Joe Ybarra: Yes to both. The quest architecture that we have is one of the very first things that we started working on when we began work on this project. As a result of that we have a fairly elaborate and interesting paradigm for how we are going to have a quest and the quest logic of the system. So going back to answering your question is any time you are going to initiative quests on one side of the Stargate and then they will take you through and have specific missions but we also will have much more elaborate and complex environment requesting than what you might normally see in an MMO especially as we try to intertwine activities that relate to the guild, squads, to non-combat game play and to exploration. As I said we will have a very elaborate and very robust questing environment. It is sort of like as a player you are playing the TV show is what it comes down to.
Bart Fiddler: Fantastic. I thank you again. I really appreciate the opportunity for the Q&A today guys. Great game -- I am looking forward to it.
Joe Ybarra: Thank you.
Sara Baker: Thanks.
Tim Jenson: Thank you all for the questions today and your time listening to us. We certainly look forward to working more closely with you as we move forward on our game. Feel free to check into our community site as it comes up. It will certainly have lots of information for you.
Sara Baker: Also if you need to contact me for any further questions, feel free to do so. Thanks.
Tim Jenson: Operator, that concludes our call.
Operator: Thank you ladies and gentlemen. This concludes today's conference. Thank you for participating. You may all disconnect.
Tim Jenson: Thank you.
Operator: Thank you.
*Please Note: Proper names/organizations spelling not verified.
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