Weekly Discussion 10/26

Lyra-Stone

Hey, how is everyone today?

One of the things we've been working hard on over here is the Help System.  You know that thing where you press H, or ctrl+h and a nice little screen comes up to help you figure out something in game?  It's pretty important for it to be there, whether you ever need it or not, just that it is there if you do happen to need it.

The question is, what do you all like to see in an in game help system?  Have there been things you wished were there in other games that you think may get overlooked?  Let us know and as always I'll be watching all week to see what you have to say.

Lyra-Stone
Lyra Studios, LLC
http://reclamationgame.com
http://underlight.com

JMandrake

I would like to see a few options for the help thing.

first of course the important things.

Bugs ( report bugs)

Cheating/abuse (report abuse or cheating in example abusing a bug or some sort.)

Harassement (not to be taken ligthly but it does happen)

Petition (that one is obvious)

Feedback (also obvious)

Moving on to the good things now.

Role play (i will explain why)

For example if there would be a Role play, this could maximize maximum experience for the players. by explainning the role play you are currently doing and putting it up in this and sending it over to the Gm team they could choose to jump into the role play by reading what is going on right now and then improvise as they arrive on site as this role play is going on right now. Other option is this could be some sort of way to introduce other role plays in the dream, and as we all known in the past where there is a GM there is a bunch around them.

Request (to request things for future role play)

 

 

If i think of more i will let ya know

kaiecohherr

A few questions:

• What are the sections you have in mind so far for the help system?
• How often do you plan to update it? What kind of staff do you have for updating the help system?
• What kind of technologies (in-game browser? Flash? images possible?) will you allow in the help system?

A few ideas:

• Compare/contrast with playing other mainstream MMRPGs to playing Reclamation. Include answers to questions like "Where do I get equipment?" or "How do I level?" or "Why can't I talk about real life events?" which is how many people will be thinking. The answers would help them understand how Reclamation works.
   
• Include links to ether Lyra or player run web sites with good resources, such as maps and the such. Since maps are so useful, it might help to have a small in-game browser that can pull up a map.
   
• Tips for how to get started with meeting people, finding quests, etc. Possibly directions from common locations to meeting places or mission boards.
   
• You may want pop-up tips for when a person does a certain action or enters a certain place. For example, if they arrive to the entrance of a house for the first time, you may want a tip to tell them where they are and how they should act. However, avoid making these tips act like advertisement pop-ups. You may want the pop-up to appear as a bar at the top of the screen possibly with a yellow tint background (similar to tooltips in windows).
   
• An in-game glossary (would work with the next item as well...)
   
• A "context help" button. You may see this in windows as a little question mark button next to the X button. You click the question mark button then click what you want to find out about.
   
• When a person first plays there, you may want to help introduce them to these help features. However, don't introduce them using a block of text. Think of how a game like Final Fantasy shows you how the menus work or how to use magic/skills in battle. It helps to have something actually show you where useful features are, then describe what you need to click to find it.

Of course any of the items above are only as good as how well they are kept up-to-date. You may want to have a feature where players can submit common questions they hear from newly awakened. You should also keep things like the glossary up-to-date with current events or terminology rather than just an basic guide.

Hope this helps!

Edit: In the third bullet changed "finding questions" to "finding quests"

JMandrake

Of course technical help and stuff like you mention would be prudent.

 

But you don't want in-game help files at disposal, like the meaning of the word nightmare, or Calenture or water for that matter. That shoudl be the interaction of dreamers and your opinion on what to name things. for example if in the dream someone sees a ormal tree and say hey this is not a tree it is a trunk, then he convince other dreamers that it is not a tree but a trunk, then it is a trunk not a tree. Then afterward if someone doesn't understand why they name that tree or all tree's, trunks, all they need to do is interact.

That is why in-game terms and stuff like that would not boast well.

I do have an extra idea, if you want to keep a log book for that kind of stuff then you write your own help make a tool possible so you can add your own data that you can use to go back too. make it all in-character and no occ in it :-)

 

The OCC could be in the help files :-)

Neveras

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Originally posted by JMandrake
I would like to see a few options for the help thing.
first of course the important things.
Bugs ( report bugs)
Cheating/abuse (report abuse or cheating in example abusing a bug or some sort.)
Harassement (not to be taken ligthly but it does happen)
Petition (that one is obvious)
Feedback (also obvious)
Moving on to the good things now.
Role play (i will explain why)
For example if there would be a Role play, this could maximize maximum experience for the players. by explainning the role play you are currently doing and putting it up in this and sending it over to the Gm team they could choose to jump into the role play by reading what is going on right now and then improvise as they arrive on site as this role play is going on right now. Other option is this could be some sort of way to introduce other role plays in the dream, and as we all known in the past where there is a GM there is a bunch around them.
Request (to request things for future role play)


If i think of more i will let ya know

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I think the mojority of the would serve better under another category than help. With a help section you want it to focus on the game's content and what might confuse a player. If I don't understand a game term or maybe even want to know a bit about a faction, that's what I'd like to see the help textr cover. Think of it as a Encyclopedia of Reclamation. Along with the basics it also should provide a glossary of information to fully help people get drawn into the world your creating.

kaiecohherr

Good point about the glossary JMandrake. While it is something that is very useful to new dreamers, it should definitely be well thoughtout.

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Another feature I was thinking of would be similar to games that have a "newbie-only" chat channel that allows them to broadcast a question or comment to people who are available to assist with newbie problems.

It would be available as another option next to "shout" or "talk" or possibly a tab of some sort.

You may want to make the channel OOC (and note that it is) since many problems might be "I'm lost. How do I get back to where I started?"

The channel should be available durring the person's XX amount of PLAYTIME hours or until they reach a certain orbit.

kaiecohherr

Definitely something you will want to cover in the tutorials/FAQ/glossary is what happens when you lose all your health/dreamsoul. You may also want to note what kind of nightmares they should try hunting initially, and which ones to avoid.

JMandrake

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[quote]I think the mojority of the would serve better under another category than help. With a help section you want it to focus on the game's content and what might confuse a player. If I don't understand a game term or maybe even want to know a bit about a faction, that's what I'd like to see the help textr cover. Think of it as a Encyclopedia of Reclamation. Along with the basics it also should provide a glossary of information to fully help people get drawn into the world your creating.[/quote]

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yea i kinda notice after i wrote my first post that it wasen't the samething they were looking for but then again it made me think. What if the help tool could also encompass all options such as the options i put in? Woudl be very easy for players to use. Look at it this way if you may, why have 2 or 3 different tool when you can have it all in one and the select what youw ish to do from that tool? Less time consuming in a way if you look at it.

kaiecohherr

To expand on the glossary, you may want to select important words such as "Shard" or "Cloudsbreak" and have a feature that links text in the chat window to those terms (or possibly a small tooltip instead of pointing into the glossary).

For example, if you're just listening and someone says the word "shard", then it would be linked and a person could click on it to find out what that is. You may want to insert a small question mark icon next to the word as well.

This feature should also have an on/off setting somewhere.

===========

One more thing I wanted to add is that a lot of prospective players will be coming from an environment where there isn't a lot of communication unless you are hunting/leveling with a group of people. I can remember a lot of hours playing MMORPGs and "/shout"ing questions over and over with no response.

kaiecohherr

A moderated in-game schedule of events would be useful as well. Many universities have a list of campus events in which hosts submit an event and the events/communications department reviews and posts it up.

You'll notice that a lot of what I mention is "in-game" since you want to avoid kicking your players out of the game to read help or use references, at which point they could easily become distracted and do something else.

I would also keep as much information as possible web-based. This would allow you to not only monitor usage, but also allow you to publish the same information online without additional work.

To help reduce client software related network usage, you may want to seperate content from presentation by using XML (the conent) and XSLT (the presentation). Using simple methods, this could then be used to create static HTML for normal web users.

Caching can also be a way to help this. However, when a person tries to access a page for the first time durring their current "gaming-session", it should check the server to see if there is a newer version (regular HTTP can do this). This will keep statistics as accurate as possible.

Shemsu

I think it would be awesome to have xml available for web folks to use for certain things such as guilds or even teachers. Many developers are beginning to offer this in order to bring more up-to-date information to their players.

I'm also in full agreement that in-game events should be available somewhere in game. I've made mention of this in another forum where, especially new players, could get a feel of the events unfolding on their server. It doesn't, and shouldn't, list everything in detail. But there is nothing wrong in hearing a message of important occurances.

Do try and cover key usage and sets.

In game help is different in many games. If Reclamation is having a GM calling button, that would be great. Or at least an issue logging system that actually reports back to you via email the outcome/escalation level, etc.

But if your're speaking of game mechanics help, the encyclopedia idea would be the most simplistic. Perhaps having a spot to type in a word/phrase in game to offer a sort of answers. This could be done within one of the in game message boards as well as through the UI.

Having all the answers in game is fine, but in a brand new game, who will have those initial answers,
short of the GM's? Role playing that a barrel is ones home is vastly different than trying to find out what an "item generator" or "item font", is. Or the different between items coloured Tan or Cyan.

Also mentioned is the importance of keeping information updated. For some of this the game itself can help keep information up to date (Ie: guilds/teachers as mentioned above).

WindWraith

WindWraith = KhaTeYana

Hello

A key map would be FANTASTIC. I cant tell you how many times in a game I was at a loss because I had to log out to go read the help files on my PC and even then it was rare to locate a keymap.

So many wonderful ideas in the other posts. I cant think of anything new to add.

Oh yes I can..

Help/tutorial pop ups. I dont know how hard the coding would be but maybe the first time or first 5 times? you clicked on something or perhapse held down CTRL=H and then clicked on something a window pops up.

Too much help though would take away from the learning RP that is a standard RP for the game and UL. Certainly the tech side should be detailed out but the fleshy stuff should require interaction on some level.

I think my favorite feature was the RP support idea. So many times a tiny visual or sound effect from an unseen source would do wonders for a RP in action. How many times did people try and get a RP going in UL that no one knew about? More than I can count. Im not saying have it an RP hotline but as was stated... any alert to the GMs that there is an RP effort going on incase they dont know about it.

I have a ton of questions about this game but Ill make another thread for that.

TTFN Khateyana

kaiecohherr

Any thoughts from the Lyra team about comments made so far? Need any additional explanation?