A completely new design philosophy: Mystery

heremypet

Imagine a MMO designed around this one principle, and try to look at how it would affect the big picture. 

Most all MMOs out there have nearly every aspect of the game lined out, graphed, and exposed, leaving no room for things like mystery, rumor, and imagination.  What would happen if there were no character sheet, no attributes like strength, intelligence, and charisma, and no such information to be found in the game at all concerning game mechanics, level, mob info, real-time maps etc?  Think about it a second because it would be vastly different than anything out there today.

For example, when you make you character, you don't choose attributes, you choose a race and bloodline etc, which may affect your attributes detailed loosely by the game, but you certainly won't know for sure, and nor would any fan site for that matter.

You won't run into a spell scroll that says "requires level 3 in necromancy", you will simply either be able to read and understand it or you wont. 

Such a game would almost certainly have to be skill based, no classes, or perhaps some sort of hidden class system based on race, deity or whatever, basically you find out whether or not you're any good with axes by picking one up and trying to use it, or just practice with it.

Suppose you approach a mob, the only basis of consideration for your chances of defeating it are, how much more scary does it look than the last one you fought, and how well did you do vs it?  Or later on once these things are found out, you will just know how tough they are. 

Imagine how exciting it would be in a world where nothing is spelled out on guides on every fansite out there even before the game launches?  If most of the actual data is kept from the player, there would be a bigger sense of mystery, and rumor about how things actually work.  There certainly would not be any "Post level and stats or achievement for invite" BS.

Same thing for maps, if maps were more fantasy like, not detailed with color etc, but looks like something a pirate would have drawn, the rest would be left to imagination and exploration.  If there were no detailed maps then it would be more difficult for fansites to piece together a detailed map, especially if the land was open and big, meaning you might actually be LOOKING AT THE WORLD when you travel instead of looking at your mini-map.

laokoko

I think that type of game exists already. Just turn off the UI.

But the problem is other player won't turn off their UI .

 

Kaisen_Dexx

 I've thought about this topic a lot, but never could decide if it was viable. It would remove a lot of what makes MMOs "accessible" today, and I'm not sure the average, modern gamer has the strength to try it.

Dewm

 

Honestly? if it was streamlined, with good graphics and well done....I think that would be awsome, sounds like alot of fun. and Deffinitly somthing I would try.

 

 

BUT it sounds like there would be great room for error... I deffinitly wouldn't trust blizzard or EA with somthing like that..... I would trust SE...

But I could see that being fun.

Axehilt

Originally posted by heremypet


Imagine how exciting it would be in a world where nothing is spelled out on guides on every fansite out there even before the game launches?  If most of the actual data is kept from the player, there would be a bigger sense of mystery, and rumor about how things actually work.  There certainly would not be any "Post level and stats or achievement for invite" BS.

 

Lack of information is the reason for fansites like Wowhead.  Do you think players would alt-tab away from the game if all of that info existed inside the game?

So by providing less info, you create an even stronger drive to have to research things offline.

I think it's fine to hide certain game mechanics from players, but the way you've described this game doesn't seem very fun.

Caldicot

I would play it.

Problem is to keep things mysterious during a longer period, wiki-technology would destroy this.

Mardy

There were games that had lots of mysteries, AC1 was a good example of that.  To make spells you had to find the right combination of herbs.  And in a class-less system, you couldn't really figure out what class someone is until they whip out their weapon or start casting on you.  Often times you couldn't even assess someone's level.

 

Gawd talking about it makes me miss AC1's good 'ol days.

heremypet

Originally posted by Mardy


There were games that had lots of mysteries, AC1 was a good example of that.  To make spells you had to find the right combination of herbs.  And in a class-less system, you couldn't really figure out what class someone is until they whip out their weapon or start casting on you.  Often times you couldn't even assess someone's level.
 
Gawd talking about it makes me miss AC1's good 'ol days.

Yea the spells in AC is just what I'm talking about, it was up to the players to find the right combination of words, if something like that were used in a crafting system, just think how awesome it would be to find out a new recipe, and to be the only fool on the server who can make that item =D

nariusseldon

I don't think it will work.

Players want to know MORE about the game, not less. Sites like wowhead & thottbot, addons like hp/mana numbers (which blizzard now has it anyway), questhelper .... show that most players are NOT interested in mystery. They are interested in upgrades and cut-to-the-chase hack-n-slash action.

Mysteries are better enjoyed as books than games.

Mardy

I have to say mystery games probably won't work out well today.  There are plenty of us that like it, but for the rest of the folks they'll want easier access, thottbot/allakhazam, etc..  It'll take a developer willing to shoot for the niche market to make something like it.  But even then there's no guaranteed success.

kaiser3282

I actually really like this idea a lot. it would certainly help more with the immersion into games for me. Hell think about it, if you woke up one day and there was some crazy outbreak of monsters and crap to fight, you wouldnt have an overhead display telling you how strong you are, how strong they are, or something telling you "you have to be x strong to use x weapon and it does x-x damage per hit". You would simply have to pick up a weapon, and learn to use it effectively, or get pwned. The biggest hinderance i can see with such a system though is technology. It would take a very vast and complex AI amongst other things in order for this to work the way i picture it. There would have to be multitudes of "randomness" thrown into every detail/mechanic for it to work properly. What i mean by that is, rather than battle (and other) mechanics being basically "my dice are bigger than yours" and being completely based on those dice rolls and specific numbers, they would need to improve the enemy AI to allow for random, exceptional things to happen. Like, youre out hunting some random fairly easy to kill mob, start hacking away at it with no fear for your life, and rather than just repeatedly biting you over and over in some place that apparently doesnt cause you to bleed to death (since youve been bitten several hundred times and are still at full health), it instead decides to latch onto your throat in a death grip and try to tear your throat out resulting in instant death. Such thinsg would certainly add in a bit more of a "fear' effect since you would constantly have to worry about dying from even the most ordinary battles.

 

Anyway some of it may not make sense i know, excuse me im tired as hell. But i guess an easier way to put it would be to make NPC AI more "human", so that its more like your fighting another player/pvping with unscripted actions that you know it is going to do every time with no variation. On top of that add in mechanics to allow targeting specific areas of the body, injuring it in different ways, having the effects actually remain active until treated properly (rather than say hamstringing someone only to have it magically heal itself and be fixed in x amount of seconds allowing you to go back to running normally), etc and thereby really impacting your ability to fight/live.

Gameloading

It's a really bad idea because the only thing you're doing is taking important information away from the players.

What's the point of not being able to know how strong you exactly are? All it leads to is frustration and it doesn't add anything to the game, it just takes things away, it's completely pointless.

Heck can you imagine just how difficult it would be to find a suitable group of players which have the same amount of strength?

heremypet

Originally posted by Gameloading


It's a really bad idea because the only thing you're doing is taking important information away from the players.
What's the point of not being able to know how strong you exactly are? All it leads to is frustration and it doesn't add anything to the game, it just takes things away, it's completely pointless.
Heck can you imagine just how difficult it would be to find a suitable group of players which have the same amount of strength?

I don't know, a suitable group of players for what?  To group up for fun, or see how far you can get?  Or to kill boss_918 located at X-12.5 // Y-515.21 with X HP and Y STR, where you need at least X DPS and Y healing power to win, who has an X% chance to drop item_8237469 with X amount of stat for Y class?  lol.. the point would be to just have fun and not worry about calculating stats.  What's wrong with a game that focuses less on stats and more on just grouping up for FUN?

Illius

I'm with Hermy.

I'd be all over a game like this that doesn't burden me with mathematics.  Doesn't make me feel like I have much impact on how well my character does since the stats seem to do all the work.

I also have a feeling that this kind of game will not fly with the current population of the genre.  Part of the population is preoccupied with crunching numbers and the other with blindly following said number crunchers because they lack the capacity to either figure it out for themselves or just refuse to put in the effort.

Kaisen_Dexx

 The problem is stat mechanics play such a huge role in games anymore that you have to explain them. A return to a more basic/simple system would have to accompany this idea.

Pcgamer81

sherlock holmes type mmo where you grab quest from npc in distress and solve clues. i had alot fun with the PC CSI games. could work i'm sure if i can enjoy historic genre mmo like pirates the burning sea no reason Mystery mmo game couldn't be either.

Alamor0

I haven't posted here in a while.  This made me return. 

Everything you've said hits the spot for me.  All I want in an MMO is a true suspension of disbelief, where I am completely immersed in the world, the lore, and who I am in said world.  But it would have to be done extremely well to achieve that. 

First of all, absolutely NOTHING could be given away.  Health bars and damage would need to be nonexistent.  Obviously, there would need to be an indicator of how much you're hurting your opponent and how much you're getting hurt.  But that can be done visually, and differently for each type of enemy.  Again, something you must figure out. 

Secondly, the behind-the-scenes calculations would need to be minimal, modifying only slightly one's chances of succeeding at different things.  In other words, it would still need a player skill focus opposed to a character skill one.  With this kind of game play, you could never spend time thinking about statistically maximizing your power.  Instead, you'd be constantly finding things out, hoping to God you made the right decision. 

As for what someone said about turning off the UI, I've done that!  Plenty of times.  It makes the game one thousand times more interesting.  I would turn off the UI, the health bars, any level indicators, everything I could.  I would leave my hotbars up, if possible, so I could still play my character.  But otherwise, I've never felt more immersed.  Of course, it only works well when PvEing.  But with a game built around this concept, PvP would be so exhilarating!

I fully support this concept.  It would be endlessly more realistic and exciting.  (Especially with a kickass death penalty.  But that's another topic. :P )

 

[Edit: Because I'm a stickler for grammar]

Gameloading

Originally posted by heremypet

Originally posted by Gameloading


It's a really bad idea because the only thing you're doing is taking important information away from the players.
What's the point of not being able to know how strong you exactly are? All it leads to is frustration and it doesn't add anything to the game, it just takes things away, it's completely pointless.
Heck can you imagine just how difficult it would be to find a suitable group of players which have the same amount of strength?

I don't know, a suitable group of players for what?  To group up for fun, or see how far you can get?  Or to kill boss_918 located at X-12.5 // Y-515.21 with X HP and Y STR, where you need at least X DPS and Y healing power to win, who has an X% chance to drop item_8237469 with X amount of stat for Y class?  lol.. the point would be to just have fun and not worry about calculating stats.  What's wrong with a game that focuses less on stats and more on just grouping up for FUN?

Because the experience won't be any fun.

If a player is significantly more powerful than the other they will either have to kill enemies that are too weak for some players, or to powerful for the others.

Also about the location and hp, str and dps and whatnot, keep in mind that will still be there in the game you suggested because it's impossible to create a game without that. You can't remove that, only hide it which would be pointless.

Alamor0

The problem here is that you're imagining a game with similar mechanics to what we currently have to choose from.

Remove the majority of the number crunching. Make people better simply because they know what they're doing not because they've spent many hours carefully monitoring various numbers, but because they've spent many hours practicing and learning. Remove static bosses. Have them roam. Have them learn. Certainly, wiki pages would arise. But they would be full of lore, knowledge about the world and how to survive, learn, and grow. Not insubstantial, unrealistic lists of immersion destroying numbers.

I'm not against the games we have currently. There's definitely something fun to be found in min-maxing. But when it comes to a true role-playing game, an intricate world to reside in when our own world isn't cuttin' it, this seems like a wonderful idea to me.

 

dave6660

 I think this is one of those ideas that look great on paper but aren't very practical.

Like others have said players would just turn to the web for information.  Over time players have become very adept to reverse engineering the mechanics of a game so the numbers behind it won't stay hidden for long.  Even if you stayed away from any web sites that gave away information, that chat channels would filled with info that spoils it for everybody else.  If you close that and ignore the other players then you've essentially turned a mmorpg into a single player rpg.

Also, what would the replay value of such a game be?  After the first time through nothing is going to be much of a mystery.

Alamor0

Originally posted by dave6660


 I think this is one of those ideas that look great on paper but aren't very practical.
Like others have said players would just turn to the web for information.  Over time players have become very adept to reverse engineering the mechanics of a game so the numbers behind it won't stay hidden for long.  Even if you stayed away from any web sites that gave away information, that chat channels would filled with info that spoils it for everybody else.  If you close that and ignore the other players then you've essentially turned a mmorpg into a single player rpg.
Also, what would the replay value of such a game be?  After the first time through nothing is going to be much of a mystery.

 

The reverse engineering works if you have HP.  I don't know how well it would work if there was not a single value available to the players.

First time through?  That truly saddens me.  Why are MMOs looked at as single player games?  I view this type of game, one without any available statistics and a lot of unknown information to the player, as something built around living in a world, not playing through a predetermined story-line.  That's what single player games are for.  How about a world where people can build houses, own villages, conquer opposing factions of real players, run a kingdom, and explore a world vast enough and ever-changing enough to avoid the feeling of 'completion'?  Instead of feeling accomplished because your character is the highest level, or accomplished because you finished the main quest-line, how about feeling accomplished because you actually did something in the world?  Like defeating a powerful NPC that's been bothering one of your ally's villages, or ambushing a group of unwary enemy players on their way to bring destruction upon your own settlement?  How about finding something nobody's found before?  Sure, these are extremely idealic and very different gamestyles than what we see currently.  But I don't think it's at all out of the realm of possibility.

heremypet

Yea, you wouldn't be able to keep people from figuring out the mechanics or posting info on websites, but the info would be speculative, and some of it just wrong.  I remember looking up quest info for EQ, seeing a whole bunch of contradictory info, then just saying screw it, and go find out for myself   I remember back in the early day of EQ, people tried to figure out how to spawn the AC.  There were so many different theories lol, but yea people figured it out, but they never knew the exact details behind it until an ex-employee leaked it.

But that's just for one quest, If much of the game were shrouded in mystery like this, it would be exciting to figure out how stuff works, just like it was exciting to see the AC pop, you didn't know EXACTLY how the spawn worked so you couldn't say 3,2,1 POP! =P