I am not advocating tedium but rather immersion. If travel is fun, logging on just to travel somewhere should be fun. If you can make progress in a dungeon with a group, then log out in a safe spot knowing that you can log on again in that safe spot and get a new group to continue your progression, then it wouldnt matter if you only played for an hour.
LOL .. there is no way to make traveling fun enough to eliminate teleports. Sure, first time it is fun. However, unless you plan on each player to visit each location only ONCE (which you will never to afford to build enough locations), traveling become tedious after the 2-3 times on the same road.
Similiar, it is silly to make long dungeon and then log out at safe spots. It is impossible to ask your group mates to all schedule their play time for you in this dungeon again.
It is MUCH better to make many short dungeons than few large ones so you can finish and move onto the next one (may be with another group) next time.
I am a casual and I found most of your ideas unworkable. Short dungeons, instancing, quests are exactly the right way to go for casuals.
I would take a middle of the road stand to the two views expressed here.
There are times where exploring a zone is immense fun, especially if the zone offers lots of surprises and random spawns. Of course, after enough times the element of surprise gives way to understanding and pulls or paths becomes automatic. That applies to every zone, including the big raid zones. After 200 molten cores, I remember the color of every brick.
That said long travelling are not likely fun, and more likely nuisance, if the purpose of the team is the dungeon at the end of the travel. A casual with only 1-2 hours on hand would not want to spend 30 minutes waiting/riding a boat and then 30 minutes walking through a desert to hit the dungeon entrance. Even if he can log out safely inside the dungeon he would never be able to explore the dungeon again, cos he never know when he can log on again, and if he can find another group that wants his class/level.
Honestly I do not like the old EQ days of spending an hour to port (wizards/druids) members to the right spire, and then march them to the zone. That 1 hour can be more enjoyable if we are doing the dungeon itself. Breaking up the mobs defending the entrance to a dungeon is another story, like the plan of power.
I am not advocating tedium but rather immersion. If travel is fun, logging on just to travel somewhere should be fun. If you can make progress in a dungeon with a group, then log out in a safe spot knowing that you can log on again in that safe spot and get a new group to continue your progression, then it wouldnt matter if you only played for an hour.
LOL .. there is no way to make traveling fun enough to eliminate teleports. Sure, first time it is fun. However, unless you plan on each player to visit each location only ONCE (which you will never to afford to build enough locations), traveling become tedious after the 2-3 times on the same road.
Similiar, it is silly to make long dungeon and then log out at safe spots. It is impossible to ask your group mates to all schedule their play time for you in this dungeon again.
It is MUCH better to make many short dungeons than few large ones so you can finish and move onto the next one (may be with another group) next time.
I am a casual and I found most of your ideas unworkable. Short dungeons, instancing, quests are exactly the right way to go for casuals.
This is the classic dilemma that MMO devs face. How to make a game that can appeal to both the casual and hardcore gamers. I tend to side with hardcore gamers, because I figure, what's the point of playing it if its not going to be challenging? But I also understand that a lot of people who love to play MMOs simply do not have the time to devote to it that hardcores do.
I agree with you hear that there really is no way to make traveling fun outside of the first or second trip somewhere. Even if you have random events pop up, that will only take you so far. This is where I think EQ got it right the very first time. Make lowbies have to travel the distance on foot, but as characters become more powerful, porting from place to place becomes the travel of choice.
And while I like many of the OP's ideas, I would also caution on limiting safe areas. True, there shouldn't be a safe area around every corner, but characters should still be able to stop and catch their breath from time to time. Even the most hardcore player will become frustrated if he gets hacked down at every turn. I remember traveling through Kithicor Forest once at night in EQ and dying about a half dozen times while simply trying to travel from one zone to another. It seemed like I lost at least two levels in the process. It was so frustrating that I was on the verge of quiting the game I loved most. So danger...good, suicide...bad.
I just kinda wanna say screw you all who say that the OP's ideas aren't good for whatever reason. I think you should give good constructive critism instead of tearing things apart.
I love your Ideas OP. Sign me up and i would play the game. I like bringing ADVENTURE back into the genre.
To the poster that said that he was a casual gamer and didn't want to play the game that you were suggesting, GOOD. You mentioned that it was a bad thing to implement these ideas. Have you considered having both long and short dungeons, or making the world beneficial to gamers that didn't play as often, just as it would reward people that did play all the time? At the heart MMO gaming as it stands benefits those that put in the most time. This manifests itself in higher levels, more gold, more items, better items (because of more time spent farming), and of course more characters. Even if you had a skill based system those that palyed more would have more skills. To knock a game because it doesn't cater to the casual gamer, well, that is just dumb. All games DON"T cater to the casual.
If you are a person that is happy with the state of the current games, then continue to play them, but don't come to forums and just bash stuff because you don't agree with them. Oh wait, i forgot that this is an internet forum and people's mission is to bash other's ideas (kinda like i'm doing now). That is irony huh?
try playing the old AD&D Eye of the Beholder series.. now that is a series of unforgiving immersive rpg adverture gaming.. there's no town at all that i can remember, you basically live off the land and loot you can find off monsters.. while fun at first, it quickly became tedious due to points you are currently looking for in today's mmorpg
No offense but who are you to be telling game developers what they should or shouldn't be doing? At the most you are a paying customer to them, but there are millions of the same thing that aren't so picky.
You can spend all day ranting to other MMO players, and maybe a very small number of professional developers (who doubtfully have a say in doing anything about your ideas) in vain or you could do something productive to bring your ideas to life, e.g. start making your own game.
That is a bit harsh.
Everyone can rant here, so can the OP. This place provides a less "commercially sponsored" arena for view exchanges and for brainstorming. The OP has his unique preference which you may or may not agree with, but shouting him off the stage is not conducive to discussion, which is the blood and life of these forums.
So far as the OP conducts his ranting in a rational and well mannered form, we should welcome him and all his views. I see no abuses from the OP, did you see any?
It wasn't my intention to offend, it's simply the truth. I really don't care how much he rants about his dreams, just getting my 2 cents in, which I believe is also my right here. I'm not and wasn't shouting him off the stage but in all reality, the only way he's going to see these things happen if he does them himself.
Since you asked, I do see some abuses but really don't care enough to point them out.
It's sad how ignorant and unimaginative people are in the MMORPG.com forums. Everyone that disagrees with the OP has a) never played an MMO or even a GAME that has done one thing that he is suggesting correctly (and there have been many) or b) completely lacks the imagination to realize the potential of his ideas.
Take, for example, nariusseldon. Clearly an idiot, nariusseldon claims that one could never make travel enjoyable past the first time. I don't know how many times I fought my way through Ogres, Reapers, Dire Wolves and Ettins from Minoc to the mountains North of the city to mine or how many times I braved the path between the Trinsic Moongate and my house in Felucca when I misplaced my rune, but I do know this...I enjoyed the adventure every time in both scenarios.
So go ahead and bash the OP's ideas. It's plainly obvious that you're too stupid to understand the concepts conjured here.
_________________________________ "Fixed it. Because that wall of text attacked me, killed me and looted my body..." -George "sniperg" Light
But sadly MMO's aren't built for adventurers anymore. Seems the new generation of MMO players also can't play a game without having a website that distills everything down to it's most basic statistics. Is it truly fun to play a game where nothing is a surprise, no thrill of discovery, of... adventure? Most can't even figure out how to build their own character and have to rely on templates - then shunning anyone who doesn't also follow the FoTW template for their class.
Because MMORPGs are never about adventure. They are about hack-n-slash and power ups. This is true even back in the EQ days. There is no adventure in EQs. It is all about camping for the best loot.
Furthermore adventure is just not economically feasible. You can only build so much content and you can only explore it once. There is no adventure if you are forced to reuse the same art assets again and again.
I am not advocating tedium but rather immersion. If travel is fun, logging on just to travel somewhere should be fun. If you can make progress in a dungeon with a group, then log out in a safe spot knowing that you can log on again in that safe spot and get a new group to continue your progression, then it wouldnt matter if you only played for an hour.
LOL .. there is no way to make traveling fun enough to eliminate teleports. Sure, first time it is fun. However, unless you plan on each player to visit each location only ONCE (which you will never to afford to build enough locations), traveling become tedious after the 2-3 times on the same road. NOT FALSIFIABLE. There's no way to do it until someone figures out how to do it.
Similiar, it is silly to make long dungeon and then log out at safe spots. It is impossible to ask your group mates to all schedule their play time for you in this dungeon again. What i'm suggesting is a few common safe areas where anyone can group up. If these areas achieve critical mass (ie, if enough people use them) it would actually be easier to get a group because you just log on and there are other people standing there ready to form a group.
It is MUCH better to make many short dungeons than few large ones so you can finish and move onto the next one (may be with another group) next time. Much better, in your opinion. But then again, my game doesnt exist and you've certainly never played it. So it's hard to say. Just thinking it won't work doesnt make it so.
I am a casual and I found most of your ideas unworkable. Short dungeons, instancing, quests are exactly the right way to go for casuals.
True. But since you game does NOT exist, it is up to YOU to convince us. Not the other way around.
And I will believe when I see it. I have played MANY MMOs and i have yet to see one that can make travel fun after the 5-10 on the same road.
I just hope some company hire the OP to lead a project.
Sure. If someone is willing to bet $50M on these ideas, more power to the persuasion skill of the OP. And I am more than happy to see if any of these work although I wouldn't hold my breath or invest my own money.
Just thought I'd point out that you CAN play WoW without ever riding a griffon ... without ever looking anything up on Thottbot ... I'm sure there's even an option or mod to kill the ? and ! over NPCs' heads. And you don't have to limit yourself to yellow quests and monsters; you can go for the red!
The game is as challenging as you make it. No one is forcing you to take the path of least resistance.
Find some hardcore friends and play hardcore.
(And of course you can do likewise in most MMOGs, not just WoW.)
If you scroll down to my second long post on the first page i describe one system that could be used to make travel interesting. Secondly, as I said in the original post, games should be designed to be smaller horizontally with most of the content restricted to dungeons. This would restrict the size of the "overland" world relatively small so running between villages wouldn't take hours. Games games should be designed so that people aren't FORCED to move from place to place, but rather given the option. As i've said in previous responses (it bears repeating), a single village/area should be designed around a story rather than a level range. Theoretically, a single village could easily be surrounded by a lot of content for nearly all levels just by developing several dungeons in a rough circle around it. Adding in my concept about dynamic zones (separate versions of areas that players enter depending on whether or not they've completed certain objectives) it's not hard to conceive how a game could be made more compact. Finally, i'm not advocating absolutely no teleporting, because teleporting, after all, could be easily presented as a natural part of the world. I'd advocate a few isolated teleportation systems that each connected two to three points rather than a single network that connects everything to everything.
I'd just like to see a game where a sense of the world's geography is an important part of the gameplay. And adding in maps will deprive every player this immersion because it's human tendency to use the options available to you. In my experience, using a map prevents you from looking at the actual world to determine your location. In everquest i'd use landmarks to determine my location but I can't say the same for WoW and Vanguard which both have maps.
You know, I have to agree with this.
When Lineage 2 first started, in order to get to an area in front of Antharas' cave (Antharas is a huge land dragon... absolutely huge.. like 'this" huge: http://www.bladenknight.com/resources/antharas_pappi.jpg ) you had to run quite a distance, through maze like canyons, fighting harder and harder monsters, until you got there. It was sort of a pain but it really was a journey.
After about a year or two they made it so that you could port to the area. In some ways it was very convenient because one didn't have to spend a lot of time only to "not" make it. Then again, I sort of missed the journey part, the epic part.
I suppose it's hard for dev's to win. On one hand they want to create an exciting epic world, but on another hand if players can't really experience the content that they want to experience, if they find themselves wrapped in tedium then they are going to move on to another game.
Games cost money to make and Publishers don't want you moving on.
Like Skyrim? Need more content? Try my Skyrim mod "Godfred's Tomb."
I am not advocating tedium but rather immersion. If travel is fun, logging on just to travel somewhere should be fun. If you can make progress in a dungeon with a group, then log out in a safe spot knowing that you can log on again in that safe spot and get a new group to continue your progression, then it wouldnt matter if you only played for an hour.
LOL .. there is no way to make traveling fun enough to eliminate teleports. Sure, first time it is fun. However, unless you plan on each player to visit each location only ONCE (which you will never to afford to build enough locations), traveling become tedious after the 2-3 times on the same road. NOT FALSIFIABLE. There's no way to do it until someone figures out how to do it.
Similiar, it is silly to make long dungeon and then log out at safe spots. It is impossible to ask your group mates to all schedule their play time for you in this dungeon again. What i'm suggesting is a few common safe areas where anyone can group up. If these areas achieve critical mass (ie, if enough people use them) it would actually be easier to get a group because you just log on and there are other people standing there ready to form a group.
It is MUCH better to make many short dungeons than few large ones so you can finish and move onto the next one (may be with another group) next time. Much better, in your opinion. But then again, my game doesnt exist and you've certainly never played it. So it's hard to say. Just thinking it won't work doesnt make it so.
I am a casual and I found most of your ideas unworkable. Short dungeons, instancing, quests are exactly the right way to go for casuals.
True. But since you game does NOT exist, it is up to YOU to convince us. Not the other way around.
And I will believe when I see it. I have played MANY MMOs and i have yet to see one that can make travel fun after the 5-10 on the same road.
If you scroll down to my second long post on the first page i describe one system that could be used to make travel interesting. Secondly, as I said in the original post, games should be designed to be smaller horizontally with most of the content restricted to dungeons. This would restrict the size of the "overland" world relatively small so running between villages wouldn't take hours. Games games should be designed so that people aren't FORCED to move from place to place, but rather given the option. As i've said in previous responses (it bears repeating), a single village/area should be designed around a story rather than a level range. Theoretically, a single village could easily be surrounded by a lot of content for nearly all levels just by developing several dungeons in a rough circle around it. Adding in my concept about dynamic zones (separate versions of areas that players enter depending on whether or not they've completed certain objectives) it's not hard to conceive how a game could be made more compact. Finally, i'm not advocating absolutely no teleporting, because teleporting, after all, could be easily presented as a natural part of the world. I'd advocate a few isolated teleportation systems that each connected two to three points rather than a single network that connects everything to everything.
I'd just like to see a game where a sense of the world's geography is an important part of the gameplay. And adding in maps will deprive every player this immersion because it's human tendency to use the options available to you. In my experience, using a map prevents you from looking at the actual world to determine your location. In everquest i'd use landmarks to determine my location but I can't say the same for WoW and Vanguard which both have maps.
Two points.
First, you are advocating making the world *smaller* to minimize on the travel "costs". It certainly helps in one aspect but it will also create a "small-world-feel". There is no magical solution, just trade-offs.
Second, I don't see why travel aids (teleport, flying griffons) are necessarily detrimental to immersion. In the context of a fantasy game, existence of teleports & flying griffons are actually quite natural.
I really do not see the need to gimping the design to make walking around an integral part of the gameplay. Just have many continuous areas to play in and you can jump around with flight path & teleports. that is a natural solution. Walk the first time, fly the second. Nothing out of place in a fantasy world.
Originally posted by etwynn If you scroll down to my second long post on the first page i describe one system that could be used to make travel interesting. Secondly, as I said in the original post, games should be designed to be smaller horizontally with most of the content restricted to dungeons. This would restrict the size of the "overland" world relatively small so running between villages wouldn't take hours. Games games should be designed so that people aren't FORCED to move from place to place, but rather given the option. As i've said in previous responses (it bears repeating), a single village/area should be designed around a story rather than a level range. Theoretically, a single village could easily be surrounded by a lot of content for nearly all levels just by developing several dungeons in a rough circle around it. Adding in my concept about dynamic zones (separate versions of areas that players enter depending on whether or not they've completed certain objectives) it's not hard to conceive how a game could be made more compact. Finally, i'm not advocating absolutely no teleporting, because teleporting, after all, could be easily presented as a natural part of the world. I'd advocate a few isolated teleportation systems that each connected two to three points rather than a single network that connects everything to everything.
I'd just like to see a game where a sense of the world's geography is an important part of the gameplay. And adding in maps will deprive every player this immersion because it's human tendency to use the options available to you. In my experience, using a map prevents you from looking at the actual world to determine your location. In everquest i'd use landmarks to determine my location but I can't say the same for WoW and Vanguard which both have maps.
Two points.
First, you are advocating making the world *smaller* to minimize on the travel "costs". It certainly helps in one aspect but it will also create a "small-world-feel". There is no magical solution, just trade-offs. I'm not arguing for a smaller world, rather, i want a more compact world. If spacious outdoor areas are replaced with bigger, multi-level dungeons; then I wouldn't consider that a loss in overall gamae area. In fact, I would consider it replacing low quality, boring content with high quality interesting content. I guess it's an issue of semantics--how do you measure a game worlds size? In response to the perceptive *feel* of the worldsize, a few things can be said. If you've been paying attention closely to this thread (not that i expect it), I've pointed out that I think outdoor areas should be largely empty except for random "events' and static camp locations. This would give an overt feeling of desolation (just be sure not to make open spaces too spacious); but, as a character adventures, he realizes just how much there is to explore in the more hidden areas. Personally, I'd much prefer this to the WoW/Vanguard model of a TON of boring outdoor space: you're told of how huge the world is, or you might deduce it from a map. But when you actually go exploring, you realize how much of it is comprised of random mobs pathing in open spaces. Big space, nothing too interesting. My model is much better, if I do say so myself.
Second, I don't see why travel aids (teleport, flying griffons) are necessarily detrimental to immersion. In the context of a fantasy game, existence of teleports & flying griffons are actually quite natural. "Finally, i'm not advocating absolutely no teleporting, because teleporting, after all, could be easily presented as a natural part of the world...I'd just like to see a game where a sense of the world's geography is an important part of the gameplay." My main complaint with teleporting is that when used excessively people lose a sense of scale and location of the world.
I really do not see the need to gimping the design to make walking around an integral part of the gameplay. Just have many continuous areas to play in and you can jump around with flight path & teleports. that is a natural solution. Walk the first time, fly the second. Nothing out of place in a fantasy world. "Gimping the design" is completely subjective. I'd argue that I'm changing the design to avoid a boring and antiquated system. And it's hardly the "natural" solution. How can you assert that? video games based on fantasy literature are entirely human constructions so there's no right or natural way of doing things. If anything, walking is more natural because it's more realistic, but I'm hardly advocating realism. And if you go read Tolkien, you don't see characters teleporting around everywhere. In fact, I can't think of a single instance of teleportation in that series. Even if you can think of one, it would not prove me wrong because teleportation in fantasy literature is restrained, if existent at all.
You might argue that it's natural because of convenient, but it only needs to be convenient because current MMORPGs force players to move around frequently. Difficulty of travel would provide a true sense of scale.
Certainly you design is different but not necessarily inferior. However, I am curious WHY you need all the content in the dungeon. If you look at WOW, much of the content is in open space with quest in the open world. In this case, you need a way (griffons & teleport) to bypass the content you have already consumed.
I do not see why it is necessarily to put all the content in dungeons. Wouldn't that be putting unnecessarily restrictions on content design? The "standard" method supports BOTH dungeon & non-dungeon content. I don't see you game support say a large plain where you need to hunt some animals for a quest. If such a large plain exists, then there also must be a method to bypass it later after a player has already consumed the content in the plain.
there are essentially two valid reasons: Immersion: In LOTR or any other fantasy setting, you don't have hundreds of enemies populating open areas. It makes no sense to have giant spiders walking around in daylight. Zombies during the daytime? Really. I'd be cool with some areas being populated at certain times (kithikor). I think you underestimate the importance of PLACE. To fight random mobs in a generic area has no "story" but if you put mobs in even a house or a cave or whatever backstory can be attributed it. That's not to say that you can't make an entire open area have a story but it would have to have static mob placement (ie, design/planning in terms of having to "pull") and anyway i would consider that an outdoor dungeon. That's not to say that I don't have problems with outdoor dungeons which brings me to my second point.
I don't agree with this reason at all. There is no reason why Orcs (or pick you humanoid enemy) cannot establish a village on open land. It is obviously up to the developers to create a believable village with the right back stories but I do not see a "dungeon" necessarily superior to house a group of enemies than a village under open land. You can also create stories about a little camp in the middle of a plain, or a village/oasis in the middle of a desert. There is no reason not to.
The static pull issue is the same whether you are inside a dungeon or not. Even in WOW (and other current MMORPGs) there are patrolling mobs. We certainly are not having a detailed discussion about mob behavior here but I do not see why static pull mob placement is particular to open space and not dungeons. It is the same issue.
The only design issue relevant here is your second point where the "dungeon" is linear or not. While i see you logic in linear dungeons and I also enjoy them, there is no reason why all the "dungeons" to be linear. There is no reason why I mix of linear and nonlinear one can work. And in fact, WOW and other MMOs are like that. Some linear instance dungeon where you go through .. and some open area for questing ("open dungeons") that you can have multiple direction of entry and attack. In fact, I flavor the openness because you actually *have* to study the location and use the geography to your advantage. For example, in some of these "enemy villages" in WOW, you can either do a frontal assault from its guarded entrance, or find a crack (some do exist) in the wall to slip into the compound. I actually find more tactical options like this fun.
Great post by the OP and in short games used to be like that but they went EASY MODE. DAOC used to be immersed but a few months back i opened an account and what used to take several months to get to max level only took me about 3-5 days. I had a full set of RARE dragon armor in a few hours played. Something that was near impossible to get years ago. A couple pieces if you were lucky.
a.) One guy stated casual players are the majority of MMO. Thats far from true. Most of my associate players or even guilds on top of guilds play 3-6 hours a day.. Thats far from casual players.
b.) Thottbot? They should call it a WOW walk through. It has every known quest in the game mapped out for a player. SO much for adventure and discovery.
Games like WOW only hold a persons interest for a short time. Longevity of sustained play simply isn't there. WOW may appeal to casual players but it doesn't' really appeal at all to veteran MMO which is growing by leaps and bounds as they get bored of their first love MM0 "World of Warcraft",
c.) Darkfall Online. I've heard about this game for so many years i forgot when i first heard about his as of current vaporware.
d.) Warhammer Online is gonna be huge. You might want to keep a close eye. 800K beta sign ups roughly. ALOT of people want real PVP and they want Wars of battle not BGs or arena's like WOWl
Personally i prefer difficulty with accomplishments that actually mean something. I like to earn my levels. I like to be better then other players gear/skill/level wise because of efforts i made. I want difficulty that fosters grouping and socialization. Teamwork is a great part of successful games. Solo all the way to max is the current way but its truly boring. I could go on and on but the OP spelled out what the majority of us VETERAN hard core MMO players are after.
Games like WOW only hold a persons interest for a short time. Longevity of sustained play simply isn't there. WOW may appeal to casual players but it doesn't' really appeal at all to veteran MMO which is growing by leaps and bounds as they get bored of their first love MM0 "World of Warcraft".
I'll bet that there are guilds in WOW full of veterans from UO and EQ. Why? Because I've been playing since the 90s, played with 3 guilds full of vets from past MMOs and that was on 1 server. WOW appeals to casuals AND veterans. There are probably more people playing WOW since release than the total playerbase from a few MMOs combined.
You know what, after reading this thread, really puzzles me. Not the small whiny details you, the OP, put so much effort in to explain.
But the fact that for some strange reason you, and some other people very commonly found on MMORPG.com, seem to long for a complete retro-MMO. You realize that I myself and many many other still playing MMOs have gone through the development of the standard MMORPG through the past 10 years.
Still, the difference is, and this is my very own personal point of interest: I'm still getting lots and lots of fun out of the modern games while you guys seem to be grieving over dead concepts all day long, going by the extent of detail your imaginary concepts incorporate.
I really, without any dislike, would love to know why? And please skip the part with the greasy new convenient gameplay killers in general and start directly with what you - personally - miss in modern games...
Comments
Similiar, it is silly to make long dungeon and then log out at safe spots. It is impossible to ask your group mates to all schedule their play time for you in this dungeon again.
It is MUCH better to make many short dungeons than few large ones so you can finish and move onto the next one (may be with another group) next time.
I am a casual and I found most of your ideas unworkable. Short dungeons, instancing, quests are exactly the right way to go for casuals.
I would take a middle of the road stand to the two views expressed here.There are times where exploring a zone is immense fun, especially if the zone offers lots of surprises and random spawns. Of course, after enough times the element of surprise gives way to understanding and pulls or paths becomes automatic. That applies to every zone, including the big raid zones. After 200 molten cores, I remember the color of every brick.
That said long travelling are not likely fun, and more likely nuisance, if the purpose of the team is the dungeon at the end of the travel. A casual with only 1-2 hours on hand would not want to spend 30 minutes waiting/riding a boat and then 30 minutes walking through a desert to hit the dungeon entrance. Even if he can log out safely inside the dungeon he would never be able to explore the dungeon again, cos he never know when he can log on again, and if he can find another group that wants his class/level.
Honestly I do not like the old EQ days of spending an hour to port (wizards/druids) members to the right spire, and then march them to the zone. That 1 hour can be more enjoyable if we are doing the dungeon itself. Breaking up the mobs defending the entrance to a dungeon is another story, like the plan of power.
Similiar, it is silly to make long dungeon and then log out at safe spots. It is impossible to ask your group mates to all schedule their play time for you in this dungeon again.
It is MUCH better to make many short dungeons than few large ones so you can finish and move onto the next one (may be with another group) next time.
I am a casual and I found most of your ideas unworkable. Short dungeons, instancing, quests are exactly the right way to go for casuals.
This is the classic dilemma that MMO devs face. How to make a game that can appeal to both the casual and hardcore gamers. I tend to side with hardcore gamers, because I figure, what's the point of playing it if its not going to be challenging? But I also understand that a lot of people who love to play MMOs simply do not have the time to devote to it that hardcores do.
I agree with you hear that there really is no way to make traveling fun outside of the first or second trip somewhere. Even if you have random events pop up, that will only take you so far. This is where I think EQ got it right the very first time. Make lowbies have to travel the distance on foot, but as characters become more powerful, porting from place to place becomes the travel of choice.
And while I like many of the OP's ideas, I would also caution on limiting safe areas. True, there shouldn't be a safe area around every corner, but characters should still be able to stop and catch their breath from time to time. Even the most hardcore player will become frustrated if he gets hacked down at every turn. I remember traveling through Kithicor Forest once at night in EQ and dying about a half dozen times while simply trying to travel from one zone to another. It seemed like I lost at least two levels in the process. It was so frustrating that I was on the verge of quiting the game I loved most. So danger...good, suicide...bad.
I just kinda wanna say screw you all who say that the OP's ideas aren't good for whatever reason. I think you should give good constructive critism instead of tearing things apart.
I love your Ideas OP. Sign me up and i would play the game. I like bringing ADVENTURE back into the genre.
To the poster that said that he was a casual gamer and didn't want to play the game that you were suggesting, GOOD. You mentioned that it was a bad thing to implement these ideas. Have you considered having both long and short dungeons, or making the world beneficial to gamers that didn't play as often, just as it would reward people that did play all the time? At the heart MMO gaming as it stands benefits those that put in the most time. This manifests itself in higher levels, more gold, more items, better items (because of more time spent farming), and of course more characters. Even if you had a skill based system those that palyed more would have more skills. To knock a game because it doesn't cater to the casual gamer, well, that is just dumb. All games DON"T cater to the casual.
If you are a person that is happy with the state of the current games, then continue to play them, but don't come to forums and just bash stuff because you don't agree with them. Oh wait, i forgot that this is an internet forum and people's mission is to bash other's ideas (kinda like i'm doing now). That is irony huh?
try playing the old AD&D Eye of the Beholder series.. now that is a series of unforgiving immersive rpg adverture gaming.. there's no town at all that i can remember, you basically live off the land and loot you can find off monsters.. while fun at first, it quickly became tedious due to points you are currently looking for in today's mmorpg
Everyone can rant here, so can the OP. This place provides a less "commercially sponsored" arena for view exchanges and for brainstorming. The OP has his unique preference which you may or may not agree with, but shouting him off the stage is not conducive to discussion, which is the blood and life of these forums.
So far as the OP conducts his ranting in a rational and well mannered form, we should welcome him and all his views. I see no abuses from the OP, did you see any?
It wasn't my intention to offend, it's simply the truth. I really don't care how much he rants about his dreams, just getting my 2 cents in, which I believe is also my right here. I'm not and wasn't shouting him off the stage but in all reality, the only way he's going to see these things happen if he does them himself.
Since you asked, I do see some abuses but really don't care enough to point them out.
It's sad how ignorant and unimaginative people are in the MMORPG.com forums. Everyone that disagrees with the OP has a) never played an MMO or even a GAME that has done one thing that he is suggesting correctly (and there have been many) or b) completely lacks the imagination to realize the potential of his ideas.
Take, for example, nariusseldon. Clearly an idiot, nariusseldon claims that one could never make travel enjoyable past the first time. I don't know how many times I fought my way through Ogres, Reapers, Dire Wolves and Ettins from Minoc to the mountains North of the city to mine or how many times I braved the path between the Trinsic Moongate and my house in Felucca when I misplaced my rune, but I do know this...I enjoyed the adventure every time in both scenarios.
So go ahead and bash the OP's ideas. It's plainly obvious that you're too stupid to understand the concepts conjured here.
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"Fixed it. Because that wall of text attacked me, killed me and looted my body..."
-George "sniperg" Light
I just hope some company hire the OP to lead a project.
Because MMORPGs are never about adventure. They are about hack-n-slash and power ups. This is true even back in the EQ days. There is no adventure in EQs. It is all about camping for the best loot.
Furthermore adventure is just not economically feasible. You can only build so much content and you can only explore it once. There is no adventure if you are forced to reuse the same art assets again and again.
Similiar, it is silly to make long dungeon and then log out at safe spots. It is impossible to ask your group mates to all schedule their play time for you in this dungeon again. What i'm suggesting is a few common safe areas where anyone can group up. If these areas achieve critical mass (ie, if enough people use them) it would actually be easier to get a group because you just log on and there are other people standing there ready to form a group.
It is MUCH better to make many short dungeons than few large ones so you can finish and move onto the next one (may be with another group) next time. Much better, in your opinion. But then again, my game doesnt exist and you've certainly never played it. So it's hard to say. Just thinking it won't work doesnt make it so.
I am a casual and I found most of your ideas unworkable. Short dungeons, instancing, quests are exactly the right way to go for casuals.
True. But since you game does NOT exist, it is up to YOU to convince us. Not the other way around.And I will believe when I see it. I have played MANY MMOs and i have yet to see one that can make travel fun after the 5-10 on the same road.
Sure. If someone is willing to bet $50M on these ideas, more power to the persuasion skill of the OP. And I am more than happy to see if any of these work although I wouldn't hold my breath or invest my own money.
Just thought I'd point out that you CAN play WoW without ever riding a griffon ... without ever looking anything up on Thottbot ... I'm sure there's even an option or mod to kill the ? and ! over NPCs' heads. And you don't have to limit yourself to yellow quests and monsters; you can go for the red!
The game is as challenging as you make it. No one is forcing you to take the path of least resistance.
Find some hardcore friends and play hardcore.
(And of course you can do likewise in most MMOGs, not just WoW.)
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You know, I have to agree with this.
When Lineage 2 first started, in order to get to an area in front of Antharas' cave (Antharas is a huge land dragon... absolutely huge.. like 'this" huge: http://www.bladenknight.com/resources/antharas_pappi.jpg ) you had to run quite a distance, through maze like canyons, fighting harder and harder monsters, until you got there. It was sort of a pain but it really was a journey.
After about a year or two they made it so that you could port to the area. In some ways it was very convenient because one didn't have to spend a lot of time only to "not" make it. Then again, I sort of missed the journey part, the epic part.
I suppose it's hard for dev's to win. On one hand they want to create an exciting epic world, but on another hand if players can't really experience the content that they want to experience, if they find themselves wrapped in tedium then they are going to move on to another game.
Games cost money to make and Publishers don't want you moving on.
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
I was going to say try UO also
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Similiar, it is silly to make long dungeon and then log out at safe spots. It is impossible to ask your group mates to all schedule their play time for you in this dungeon again. What i'm suggesting is a few common safe areas where anyone can group up. If these areas achieve critical mass (ie, if enough people use them) it would actually be easier to get a group because you just log on and there are other people standing there ready to form a group.
It is MUCH better to make many short dungeons than few large ones so you can finish and move onto the next one (may be with another group) next time. Much better, in your opinion. But then again, my game doesnt exist and you've certainly never played it. So it's hard to say. Just thinking it won't work doesnt make it so.
I am a casual and I found most of your ideas unworkable. Short dungeons, instancing, quests are exactly the right way to go for casuals.
True. But since you game does NOT exist, it is up to YOU to convince us. Not the other way around.And I will believe when I see it. I have played MANY MMOs and i have yet to see one that can make travel fun after the 5-10 on the same road.
If you scroll down to my second long post on the first page i describe one system that could be used to make travel interesting. Secondly, as I said in the original post, games should be designed to be smaller horizontally with most of the content restricted to dungeons. This would restrict the size of the "overland" world relatively small so running between villages wouldn't take hours. Games games should be designed so that people aren't FORCED to move from place to place, but rather given the option. As i've said in previous responses (it bears repeating), a single village/area should be designed around a story rather than a level range. Theoretically, a single village could easily be surrounded by a lot of content for nearly all levels just by developing several dungeons in a rough circle around it. Adding in my concept about dynamic zones (separate versions of areas that players enter depending on whether or not they've completed certain objectives) it's not hard to conceive how a game could be made more compact. Finally, i'm not advocating absolutely no teleporting, because teleporting, after all, could be easily presented as a natural part of the world. I'd advocate a few isolated teleportation systems that each connected two to three points rather than a single network that connects everything to everything.
I'd just like to see a game where a sense of the world's geography is an important part of the gameplay. And adding in maps will deprive every player this immersion because it's human tendency to use the options available to you. In my experience, using a map prevents you from looking at the actual world to determine your location. In everquest i'd use landmarks to determine my location but I can't say the same for WoW and Vanguard which both have maps.
Two points.
First, you are advocating making the world *smaller* to minimize on the travel "costs". It certainly helps in one aspect but it will also create a "small-world-feel". There is no magical solution, just trade-offs.
Second, I don't see why travel aids (teleport, flying griffons) are necessarily detrimental to immersion. In the context of a fantasy game, existence of teleports & flying griffons are actually quite natural.
I really do not see the need to gimping the design to make walking around an integral part of the gameplay. Just have many continuous areas to play in and you can jump around with flight path & teleports. that is a natural solution. Walk the first time, fly the second. Nothing out of place in a fantasy world.
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Two points.
First, you are advocating making the world *smaller* to minimize on the travel "costs". It certainly helps in one aspect but it will also create a "small-world-feel". There is no magical solution, just trade-offs. I'm not arguing for a smaller world, rather, i want a more compact world. If spacious outdoor areas are replaced with bigger, multi-level dungeons; then I wouldn't consider that a loss in overall gamae area. In fact, I would consider it replacing low quality, boring content with high quality interesting content. I guess it's an issue of semantics--how do you measure a game worlds size? In response to the perceptive *feel* of the worldsize, a few things can be said. If you've been paying attention closely to this thread (not that i expect it), I've pointed out that I think outdoor areas should be largely empty except for random "events' and static camp locations. This would give an overt feeling of desolation (just be sure not to make open spaces too spacious); but, as a character adventures, he realizes just how much there is to explore in the more hidden areas. Personally, I'd much prefer this to the WoW/Vanguard model of a TON of boring outdoor space: you're told of how huge the world is, or you might deduce it from a map. But when you actually go exploring, you realize how much of it is comprised of random mobs pathing in open spaces. Big space, nothing too interesting. My model is much better, if I do say so myself.
Second, I don't see why travel aids (teleport, flying griffons) are necessarily detrimental to immersion. In the context of a fantasy game, existence of teleports & flying griffons are actually quite natural. "Finally, i'm not advocating absolutely no teleporting, because teleporting, after all, could be easily presented as a natural part of the world...I'd just like to see a game where a sense of the world's geography is an important part of the gameplay." My main complaint with teleporting is that when used excessively people lose a sense of scale and location of the world.
I really do not see the need to gimping the design to make walking around an integral part of the gameplay. Just have many continuous areas to play in and you can jump around with flight path & teleports. that is a natural solution. Walk the first time, fly the second. Nothing out of place in a fantasy world. "Gimping the design" is completely subjective. I'd argue that I'm changing the design to avoid a boring and antiquated system. And it's hardly the "natural" solution. How can you assert that? video games based on fantasy literature are entirely human constructions so there's no right or natural way of doing things. If anything, walking is more natural because it's more realistic, but I'm hardly advocating realism. And if you go read Tolkien, you don't see characters teleporting around everywhere. In fact, I can't think of a single instance of teleportation in that series. Even if you can think of one, it would not prove me wrong because teleportation in fantasy literature is restrained, if existent at all.
You might argue that it's natural because of convenient, but it only needs to be convenient because current MMORPGs force players to move around frequently. Difficulty of travel would provide a true sense of scale.
Certainly you design is different but not necessarily inferior. However, I am curious WHY you need all the content in the dungeon. If you look at WOW, much of the content is in open space with quest in the open world. In this case, you need a way (griffons & teleport) to bypass the content you have already consumed.
I do not see why it is necessarily to put all the content in dungeons. Wouldn't that be putting unnecessarily restrictions on content design? The "standard" method supports BOTH dungeon & non-dungeon content. I don't see you game support say a large plain where you need to hunt some animals for a quest. If such a large plain exists, then there also must be a method to bypass it later after a player has already consumed the content in the plain.
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I don't agree with this reason at all. There is no reason why Orcs (or pick you humanoid enemy) cannot establish a village on open land. It is obviously up to the developers to create a believable village with the right back stories but I do not see a "dungeon" necessarily superior to house a group of enemies than a village under open land. You can also create stories about a little camp in the middle of a plain, or a village/oasis in the middle of a desert. There is no reason not to.
The static pull issue is the same whether you are inside a dungeon or not. Even in WOW (and other current MMORPGs) there are patrolling mobs. We certainly are not having a detailed discussion about mob behavior here but I do not see why static pull mob placement is particular to open space and not dungeons. It is the same issue.
The only design issue relevant here is your second point where the "dungeon" is linear or not. While i see you logic in linear dungeons and I also enjoy them, there is no reason why all the "dungeons" to be linear. There is no reason why I mix of linear and nonlinear one can work. And in fact, WOW and other MMOs are like that. Some linear instance dungeon where you go through .. and some open area for questing ("open dungeons") that you can have multiple direction of entry and attack. In fact, I flavor the openness because you actually *have* to study the location and use the geography to your advantage. For example, in some of these "enemy villages" in WOW, you can either do a frontal assault from its guarded entrance, or find a crack (some do exist) in the wall to slip into the compound. I actually find more tactical options like this fun.
Great post by the OP and in short games used to be like that but they went EASY MODE. DAOC used to be immersed but a few months back i opened an account and what used to take several months to get to max level only took me about 3-5 days. I had a full set of RARE dragon armor in a few hours played. Something that was near impossible to get years ago. A couple pieces if you were lucky.
a.) One guy stated casual players are the majority of MMO. Thats far from true. Most of my associate players or even guilds on top of guilds play 3-6 hours a day.. Thats far from casual players.
b.) Thottbot? They should call it a WOW walk through. It has every known quest in the game mapped out for a player. SO much for adventure and discovery.
Games like WOW only hold a persons interest for a short time. Longevity of sustained play simply isn't there. WOW may appeal to casual players but it doesn't' really appeal at all to veteran MMO which is growing by leaps and bounds as they get bored of their first love MM0 "World of Warcraft",
c.) Darkfall Online. I've heard about this game for so many years i forgot when i first heard about his as of current vaporware.
d.) Warhammer Online is gonna be huge. You might want to keep a close eye. 800K beta sign ups roughly. ALOT of people want real PVP and they want Wars of battle not BGs or arena's like WOWl
Personally i prefer difficulty with accomplishments that actually mean something. I like to earn my levels. I like to be better then other players gear/skill/level wise because of efforts i made. I want difficulty that fosters grouping and socialization. Teamwork is a great part of successful games. Solo all the way to max is the current way but its truly boring. I could go on and on but the OP spelled out what the majority of us VETERAN hard core MMO players are after.
I'll bet that there are guilds in WOW full of veterans from UO and EQ. Why? Because I've been playing since the 90s, played with 3 guilds full of vets from past MMOs and that was on 1 server. WOW appeals to casuals AND veterans. There are probably more people playing WOW since release than the total playerbase from a few MMOs combined.
You know what, after reading this thread, really puzzles me. Not the small whiny details you, the OP, put so much effort in to explain.
But the fact that for some strange reason you, and some other people very commonly found on MMORPG.com, seem to long for a complete retro-MMO. You realize that I myself and many many other still playing MMOs have gone through the development of the standard MMORPG through the past 10 years.
Still, the difference is, and this is my very own personal point of interest: I'm still getting lots and lots of fun out of the modern games while you guys seem to be grieving over dead concepts all day long, going by the extent of detail your imaginary concepts incorporate.
I really, without any dislike, would love to know why? And please skip the part with the greasy new convenient gameplay killers in general and start directly with what you - personally - miss in modern games...
Meridion