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General: Richard Aihoshi Wants Variety In MMOs
Dana
Member Posts: 2,415
Variety or the lack thereof is the topic of this week's column from Richard Aihoshi.
From a thematic standpoint, although I certainly have nothing against fantasy, it does seem over-weighted. Sure, we have plenty of variations, but when we strip things down to the basics, a fireball is a fireball is a fireball. What I'd far prefer to see is developer undertake much more exploration into other genres. And I don't just mean science fiction; even though there are still many popular properties that could potentially be adapted into compelling virtual worlds, I'm primarily referring to other possible categories.
A huge one that comes to mind immediately is history. It's not difficult to find titles based on the Three Kingdoms period in China. Actually, there are quite a few more in the market there than just the imports we see here. We can easily understand that this is so because we know they're created by companies primarily aiming at the enormous domestic audience. What's more difficult to explain is why all the similarly rich possibilities from other regions and cultures remain barely touched upon if not completely ignored.
Read it all here.
Dana Massey
Formerly of MMORPG.com
Currently Lead Designer for Bit Trap Studios
Comments
Yay for Monty Python references!
How about a Knights Who Say NI! (nee? Knee? NII?) game or
A game about reincarnation and becoming a bodhisatva. How cool is that?
You've regained me as a reader Richard, excellent article
I'd kill people to play on a proper Mecha based MMO
This or a cyberpunk mmo.
This or a cyberpunk mmo.
Cyberpunk MMO -> Cyberpunk -> Neil Stephenson -> Snow Crash -> Metaverse -> Second Life
Cyberpunk MMO -> ... -> Second Life
But yea, I agree. A good Mecha or Cyberpunk MMO would be nice.
With regards to why we don't see similar "historical" MMOs in other markets, I think it has a LOT to do with culture. Most of the Scandinavians I meet know less about their own mythology than they do about Native Americans.
Funny, you mention tons of historic areas/eras, but skip ancient Egypt. And there is one game that at least starts in a kind of ancient Egypt: A Tale In The Desert. And it isn't like any other MMO (I know) either.
Not to say it's a great MMO, but it is certainly something different and I honestly prefer a small playerbase over being just a number.
I've typically seen a lot of people don't like historical games as opposed to wild new settings. Why? They're much more foreign and generally exciting.
What's the point in making a Civil War? The Union won, you can't change that. Sure, the game can, but it still wouldn't feel right. A Roman empire MMO? Sounds cool, considering the amount of land the Romans conquered, but in the end, they get conquered themselves 500 AD, so there really is no point. So why are WW2 FPS and RTS games so popular? The history is familiar (it was only 60 odd years ago) and the gameplay is fast-paced and fun. Sci-fi and fantasy games offer people a doorway into a whole other world and life, where the story is uncertain and changing. You can't change history, only alter it severely which I find as a history buff to be disrespectful in it's own right.
Remember that one game, Fall of Liberty for the 360? Churchill is killed in his taxi accident, and Hitler attacks New York City. How is that honoring all those brave men and women (and somtimes children on the homefront) who helped the war effort? It's making a complete mockery over real historical events.
To recap:
Historical MMOs? No. Why?
- No uncertainty, you can get a better understanding of the world through Wikipedia for crying out loud
Altered history? Again, no. Why?
- Takes away from the original historical events
- Disrespects the people who actually lived during such events
Then why do people make historical movies, such as the [fictional] Gladiator, or Kingdom of Heaven? In these, you watch a story about whether historical or fictional characters living through a very real time period. [usually *cough* Life of Brian, still funny though] They pay tribute to the original historical events. I don't want to be a Gaul player PvPing in Rome, killing hordes of Roman soldiers to level up and gain loot to better my character. If I were playing a Gaul in a game, I'd want to play a Gaul to better grasp the -actual- sacking of Rome.
Many MMOs are also loot-driven, PvP-driven, or a combination of the two. A true army for instance in say, the American Revolution, would be trained and equipped with the same gear (depending on their role in the army). There was no "lvl3 Captain with +1 Strength rifle." There was just the Captain, his superious, and his inferiors, all trained to act in accordance with their rank. You also wouldn't be able to coordinate proper battles; anyone who disagrees with me, try organizing a few hundred players all in different parts of the world, different pings, ages andcomputer hardware, to form them into a proper line battle. Good luck.
To quote Morpheus: "No, what happened, happened, and couldn't of have happened any other way."
Nice ideas.
One issue:
Dance MMOs are hard because there are only two possible classes of characters. The kid from the right and the kid from the wrong side of the tracks. See for example.....i was going to name some examples but actually ANY dance movie.
Some other ideas:
Two areas of the supernatural, somewhat religiously based, I'd love to see - ghosts and dieties/demons.
Many religions share some common traits as to demi-gods/demons whether they are called angels, loas, 'gods/goddesses' (in many religions gods have like powers to angels in judeo-christian-islamic tradition. Some ideas for game setup - Ability to influence the world to some extent, shapeshifting, possession.
Ghosts - Either playing as the still living or as the ghosts.
"Never met a pack of humans that were any different. Look at the idiots that get elected every couple of years. You really consider those guys more mature than us? The only difference between us and them is, when they gank some noobs and take their stuff, the noobs actually die." - Madimorga
Yes the MMO fantisy catagory has been way outraded with the fantisy. I am tired of each and every game that comes along that wants to be the wow killer.
Maybee an MMO for race car driving, or how about one for being a mafia type from the 30's. Something interesting.
Or we could even make an MMO fantisy football type of thing.
I agree with the dance MMO thing. Why make an MMO when people can just play Dance Dance Revolution? Although the article, he did state he didn't have a wild imagination. For the deity idea, that sounds interesting. Of course you wouldn't name any of the characters off current day deities, but that idea of mythical/godly war is neat. Minotaur vs. Hercules/Pegasus anyone?
What about "historically inspired alternate universe"? A steampunk game would be awesome. Or game based on the premise that some pivotal historic event (such as the Civil War) went the other way. What would life be like today if the South had successfully seceded from the Union? Could be interesting to imagine.
some good brain food here, and a Wild Wild West (with Will smith doing voice work) could be very fun...
The thing with MMOs i've noticed is:
a: either your one of a million so nothing you do matters
b: what you do matters, but it feels like a single player game, forcing you to ignore all the other pople who matter (cause they did the same thing you did to save the world but at a different time, but in lore it was at the same time)
If there was a dance MMO, it wouldn't be considered an MMO as today's standards are concerned - BUT, I feel that a lot of the current MMO genre will be short lived as social networking pushes forward. MMOs that cater to the casual player will eventually meld into social networking. Sooo, that being said, I could see a dance MMO coming out, not in 10 years from now... but 5. Why? Project Natal for the Xbox 360. It will be a big thing and combined with the Xbox Live service, I could definately see a virtual world being applied to the Dance, Dance revolution concept. Hrm .. a whole new concept to being served in "dance off" pvp arenas. But, unlike current brain dead MMOs, it will actually require player skill - rather than epeen grinding (pun intended).
As for historical MMOs, I can see this being VERY touchy. For example, the amount of crap a game company would be put through in the United States, including multiple law suits, if someone tried to create an MMO that included Native Americans. The wild west could also stir up some trouble as most of it was ruled by corporate greed and government corruption. Finally, a civil war MMO would be a no-no simply because it wouldn't be a re-enactment (unless it was handled like WW2 Online is currently). There are many people in the south that still wave the confederate flag and the sad thing is that most people think of it as the war that ended slavery. The war had nothing to do with slavery - liberation was a bi-product and not the cause. Historical MMOs referencing a period within the past 200 years could cause a lot of bad PR for an upcoming MMO these days.
I want to see a wild west sandbox MMO.
I'm not here to complete my forum PVP dailies.
The problem with historical games is...we already know how the story ends, in a civil war game if you roll southern you'll inevitably lose, if you roll Nazi you'll end up getting jesus stomped, if you roll traditionalist in feudal japan you'll eventually lose to westernization.
Which is why you start from an Alternate History premise where some pivotal event was flopped and so now the outcome is completely unknowable.
What if D-Day had been unsuccessful? What if the South had won at Gettysburg? What if Washington never made it across the Delaware?
Take any of these pivotal moments, flip them around, start the game from 3 months later in the aftermath and see where things go.
Why does every game have to decide what genre or universe it should belong to. It's always about putting stuff into genres, I would love if developers tried creating something instead of limiting themselves to fictional boundaries set by game critics.
This or a cyberpunk mmo.
A fusion of those would be totally awesome
Instead of worrying about variety in mmos, can we actually have a good mmo first ? I mean if it wasn't for WoW's success and popularity would anyone care about mmos ? No because the large majority of them are horrendous. Give me quality instead of quantity please!
We are no longer the Knights who say Ni... We are now the Knights who say "Ekke Ekke Ekke Ekke Ptang Zoo Boing Zow Zing"
A game based on the movie Time Bandits would be fun. Remember the final scene in the Castle of Ultimate Darkness?
I'd be up for a SciFi/Horror saaaay something along the lines of Dead Space, but a Monty Python based MMO would be hilarious and extremely fun
.
Yeah, you picked a good one this time Mr. Aihoshi.!
One category that could stand out is Mythology...(not fantasy)... but the psychological and social morees that human culture is based in all cultural regions.. I mean every region has their representation of Diana, ,Poisidon, Herculese, Dyonysius, Set, Ra, Khem, Jupiter, Hermes, Maat, , Ruchirah, Krishna, and the list goes on.... and you get the point.
Mmorpg gaming is in a lagrge part based off of the the psychologial keys that make us WANT TO PLAY..aka..DESIRE. Freud and Jung wrote detailed descriptions of these keys in their volumes of literature.
For example a game based on the goddess "Ceres" would be one that focuses on crafting, production, and nuturing,vs the more popular fighting, controlling, and conquering.
A game based on Krishna would be one based on how many in game love-relationships a character could engender.
A game based on Hermes would be one that specialized in natural magic and how nature itself can be controled.
So on and so forth. Oh yes, there is so much more that could be done in the conceptualization of mmorpgs.
Great post...1 bump for you!!!
I believe Dana Massey did a column on the idea of a "comedy MMO" in his "Why not?" article a while back.
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As for variety... I would just like different things to do, rather than "screw high fantasy, it's been around forever!" Frankly, I enjoy the whole ridiculous elves, dwarves, trolls, etc. etc.
Hell, in WoW, I wish I could play as a third faction, or a fourth faction, with races like the Harpies and Naga as Neutral and Hostile, respectively. Centaur, Ogres, Silithid, Daemons, Imps, those Robots from Tempest Keep, ELEMENTALS, BEASTS - playing Orcs from the Searing Blade/Burning Blade/Shadow Council. Then there's Humans, Knolls, Goblins and such from Buccaneer Bay Pirates...
I mean, from that end alone, WoW has plenty of potential Expansion there, and due to it's fantastic game engine (which I love, and don't think anyone's made as stable a client since) I would probably end up sticking around for a while.
Minigames would be a half-decent addition to any existing game - doesn't Runes of Magic do that with their crafting and things?
Anyway, meh, I like high fantasy, but I could go a steampunk or mecha game - mecha would be nice if they made character creation somewhat modular - Imaging adding various parts onto your Mech and seeing them in-game as you add them on. If you have a rocket launcher attached to your right shoulder, they're going to see it. If you have a small radar attachment on your headpiece, if someone's looking close enough, they should see it. There's a lot of room for improvement with the current look of "equipping" something...
I am playing EVE and it's alright... level V skills are a bit much.
You all need to learn to spell.
Yet, to truly start from the point on which you left off would be to firstly BALANCE the mmo genres and have a good equalization on the current mmorpg concepts.
EX. more steampunk, more historical, more space flight, more f2p sims, more sports, and more driving .....more.....
Answer to why there isnt games based on things you mentioned: they are way too restricting. Fantasy/SciFi is limitless and with little variations they can seem as totally different games.
Ancient Greece. I would like game built on it, still it would have to be fantasy as it would be built on myths.
Roman Empire? Game about what? Killing barbarians and conquering the world till you get destroyed? Good idea for single player but I think it was already done in some manners..
Middle ages? Dragons and Witches and Knights and Maidens? Dont think that would be enough.
WWII? FPS.. Dont see where to fit in MMO.
It may be that I lack imagination...
Games built on facts would be boring as it would remind reality too much and there isnt much variation or it would become FANTASY.
So in the end it is FANTASY. But yeah they could take some aspects from myths/past and create MMOG about it, but dont wish it would look like anything like Real past.
Sports, dancing, steampunk (in my eyes dark SciFi), mythical (Fantasy). Go for it..