How little content is acceptable?....

Nikkons017

People want all these new features, these different experiences and vastly and more complex interactions with everything.....

 

so if you could get all those great features in a game that were very polished, how little content would be acceptable?

 

would you like 1-2 cities with only 1-2 races?

1-2 zones?/area?

 

barring that more content would be created as expansions but what do you guys think?

Credinus

Honestly, I think the best answer I can give to this would be:

Enough content to give the majority of your target players something to do until the next content update.

For instance, let's say Warhammer Online released with just Tier 1 content and let's say most of their playerbase one week to finish Tier 1. So, you better be able to bring out Tier 2 after one week. I only use WAR for this example because it's easier to visualize.

However, the problem comes in with that commitment. How many games have released under this concept of "we'll add the next content update to extend the game out further quickly" and players end up sitting at level cap for months with nothing to do?

Death1942

2 things:

 

Enough content to keep the playerbase going until the next content update (which should be regular and speedy, while still being as polished as the first lot of content).

 

They don't promise more than what is in the game from launch.  I am happy if they say only 1 city at launch with 5 zones so long as they provide that at launch.  I would also expect a development time a few months to a year less if they are promising that much content. 

Nikkons017

Originally posted by Death1942


2 things:
 
Enough content to keep the playerbase going until the next content update (which should be regular and speedy, while still being as polished as the first lot of content).
 
They don't promise more than what is in the game from launch.  I am happy if they say only 1 city at launch with 5 zones so long as they provide that at launch.  I would also expect a development time a few months to a year less if they are promising that much content. 

 

This is where i see the disconnect between developers and players. Players want the latest and greatest but they are not willing to wait for it to be developed.

The more involved and complex and "immersive" you make things, you are putting in tons on interactions into a few resources so naturally you'd get less content but more interactive content. So to keep things "speedy" as you put it, you would either have to wait longer for the content (thus people will be waiting unless content playability can be multiplied) or players have to accept smaller content updates (thus they might run out of things to do before the next one or might not really do much) or maybe some combination of both.

 

This is especially true since everything must be polished which takes massive amounts of time.

UnsungToo

2 Boats

2 fishing poles

5 different test lb lines

4 lakes

10 lures

10 different fish

1 house with trophy room that has fish tanks for live veiwable trophies

1 in-game store (not a cash shop)

1 set of leader boards for each fish

1 Set of  leader boards for top racing times per lake and per boat

 

 

AlysenMinase

For some reason I think this was inspired by Mortal Online >.>

Aseenus

Content is very important in MMO's, without content you will quit after a few hours/days.

Death1942

Originally posted by Nikkons017

Originally posted by Death1942


2 things:
 
Enough content to keep the playerbase going until the next content update (which should be regular and speedy, while still being as polished as the first lot of content).
 
They don't promise more than what is in the game from launch.  I am happy if they say only 1 city at launch with 5 zones so long as they provide that at launch.  I would also expect a development time a few months to a year less if they are promising that much content. 

 

This is where i see the disconnect between developers and players. Players want the latest and greatest but they are not willing to wait for it to be developed.

The more involved and complex and "immersive" you make things, you are putting in tons on interactions into a few resources so naturally you'd get less content but more interactive content. So to keep things "speedy" as you put it, you would either have to wait longer for the content (thus people will be waiting unless content playability can be multiplied) or players have to accept smaller content updates (thus they might run out of things to do before the next one or might not really do much) or maybe some combination of both.

 

This is especially true since everything must be polished which takes massive amounts of time.

 

trying to find the balance between the current content and future content is all but impossible.

 

Trying to crank out content at a similar level of polish that took about 2 months to make (and lasted 3 weeks for players) in 3 weeks is too much effort on the devs.  This is no doubt why games are released with as much content as possible and slowly updated over the years instead of releasing in a base form and steadily expanding it as quickly as possible.

Nikkons017

trying to find the balance between the current content and future content is all but impossible.
 
Trying to crank out content at a similar level of polish that took about 2 months to make (and lasted 3 weeks for players) in 3 weeks is too much effort on the devs.  This is no doubt why games are released with as much content as possible and slowly updated over the years instead of releasing in a base form and steadily expanding it as quickly as possible.

 

if you are making that kind of content then i would say yes. Would you logically think that if you wanted to release the game in its base form that all "content" that you did create was made to have maximum replayability over the long term..

Like instead of creating a single quest , you create a quest generator or something to that effect.

 

Or content like a bounty hunting system expands pvp greatly in the entire world and is not limited to one zone or area or even player level or skill. And as long as people kill other people or stir up trouble then players themselves will create content continually and thus you get essentially unlimited content for your investment of creating a system that players themselves fuel.

brostyn

You're asking an unfair question. The smallest amount of content I'm willing to accept is the largest amount of content you're willing to give.

That reminds me of when I'm at an interview, and they ask "What would you like to make?" I feel like answering "As much as you're willing to pay."

 

When a game releases I think there should be enough content until the next content upgrade. That makes sense doesn't it?

Now something to remember is that most people will create tons of alts, and take even longer to do the original content. Of course, you will have a few dedicated pyshcos you will try to do the content faster than they can chug a 16 oz. Screw them. They can create alts, too.

 

Blazz

As long as the game is interesting and fun I will enjoy it.

If you have some sort of long storyline arc that players can do that will take them all the way to the maximum level, like a single player RPG, that takes something like 60 hours to complete, good work - you've done enough in my books to be a good game developer.

If you have lots of ways to create your own content passively, such as bounty boards and whatever else, and players have a reason to want to kill other players (and perhaps to alter the bounties by saying "I'll chip in for the death of so-and-so!") - well then, good for you, that's a pretty nice system you got there.

The problem with only focussing on one type or the other is that people have their own playstyles, and you will be cutting someone out if you only make one type.

They're both delicious ice cream, but some people just like vanilla over chocolate, and vice versa.

 

I myself have, admittedly, found some sort of sense of self-satisfaction when doing a difficult PVE quest all by myself - even though it was meant to be a group quest, serving the purpose of shoving players together and saying "Hey! Isn't it great that you're playing an MMO?"

 

I want enough content to be content.

(Don't you just love the english language?)

Jimmac

Originally posted by Nikkons017
 
how little content would be acceptable?

 

Unacceptable:



- A fully destructable environment that consists entirely of asteroids

- Any game that uses the term sandbox as an excuse not to add more server side depth and or content to a game (i.e. Eve PVE)

- Any game that relies on the userbase to complete the game for them and calling it a feature. (i.e. Xsyon)

GTwander

Originally posted by Jimmac

Originally posted by Nikkons017
 
how little content would be acceptable?

 

Unacceptable:



- A fully destructable environment that consists entirely of asteroids

- Any game that uses the term sandbox as an excuse not to add more server side depth and or content to a game (i.e. Eve PVE)

- Any game that relies on the userbase to complete the game for them and calling it a feature. (i.e. Xsyon)

 

A. Auto Assault did destructable environments right and got nowhere. That game was awesome.

B. There is more to EVE PvE than just missions. If you have to argue there isn't, then you deserve /facepalm

C. You make a big assumption on a game you've only heard about for a week or so.

Jimmac

- No idea what your first comment has to do with my first commen

- I've done all the types of PVE in Eve. I wasn't just talking about missions. What I said is true for all of it.

- Yup it was a guess. We'll see. Out of all the MMO's that have been released in a crap stage, I think developers are finally catching on. "We aren't going to finish the game anyway, why not claim this was intentional and have it be a feature?" Even if Xsyon isn't an example, what I said still applies to any other games like that. 

 

 

inBOIL

Originally posted by Nikkons017



 would you like 1-2 cities with only 1-2 races?
1-2 zones?/area?
 

 

if theres thousands of variables and you can play with those then even 1 zone might be too much.

 

Wharg0ul

Really depends on your definition of "content".

If you define "content" as quest-based themepark garbage......it would take a LOT. This is the kind of content that players can burn through....and then are left wondering "now what?" Think of a book or movie here, once it's over, you can repeat it once or twice, but after that it's the same old shit, over and again.

If your definition of content is of the sand-box style (i.e. crafting, housing, player owned cities, etc) you don't really need that MUCH as long as it's fun and engaging. Think of a box of legos, where the possible combinations and activities with these tools are virtually endless.

GTwander

Originally posted by Wharg0ul


Really depends on your definition of "content".
If you define "content" as quest-based themepark garbage......it would take a LOT. This is the kind of content that players can burn through....and then are left wondering "now what?" Think of a book or movie here, once it's over, you can repeat it once or twice, but after that it's the same old shit, over and again.
If your definition of content is of the sand-box style (i.e. crafting, housing, player owned cities, etc) you don't really need that MUCH as long as it's fun and engaging. Think of a box of legos, where the possible combinations and activities with these tools are virtually endless.

 

The problem is that with sandboxes is that there's no content to someone with no imagination or initiative.

Wurm has to be one of the most complex and epic MMOs I ever played, and there is still people going into the free server and complaining about there "being nothing to do"... which blows my mind. Lots of sandbox games do have little content when it comes to choices of options available, but for a game that allows you to raise islands, tunnel mountains and build anything - people sure have no clue what to do with it all sometimes. That game is legos if there ever was one, and some people have no clue what to do with those either.

Axehilt

If you have zero cities, no race selection, but 1000+ hours of diverse, interesting, fun things to do, you have plenty of content.

I measure content by how many hours a game holds my interest.  Race count, city count, class count; none of these things matter if the game is providing me a constant deluge of interesting things to do.

Mellow44

Those who are fans of Dragon Age: Origins got really excited when an x-pack got announced shortly after the release of the main game never realizing that it should have been in the game from the beginning.

This nickel and dimeing that is going on by the game makers or their publishers just makes me angry.

 

Squishydew

MMOwise, enough content to play 20+ hours a week without repeating content you've already done before that week.

GTwander

Originally posted by Agoden


MMOwise, enough content to play 20+ hours a week without repeating content you've already done before.

 

I hope you are not serious.

There are long-winded RPG's you'd be through with in a month - how can you expect an MMO to do better? Especially with unique content like raids n' junk, how are they supposed to make enough of that to never rehash any of it?

Rockgod99

This is why i feel sandbox games are the future.

Toss us one over sized game world, fill it with mobs then add player tools and we will evolve the game for you.

Want missions? Dungeons? reasons to pvp? player run economy? player cities? give us the tools.

Why waste your time having to develop new content patches all the time for those power levelers? Let them create not just conquer.

GTwander

Ya, but lots of people don't have the creativity to make interesting content with those tools, and even more don't have the initiative to even mess with them. You either feel enthralled by the sandbox's options at hand, or can't figure out a single thing to do and blame the game.

Rockgod99

Originally posted by GTwander


Ya, but lots of people don't have the creativity to make interesting content with those tools, and even more don't have the initiative to even mess with them. You either feel enthralled by the sandbox's options at hand, or can't figure out a single thing to do and blame the game.

 

I agree but I think thats more the developers fault. The tools need to be easy to understand and fun to use.

As an example, Saga of ryzom has a scenario creation tool. This thing has no tutorial, is complicated and gives no reward for someone actually building it. This feature would fail if it was the only way to create missions in the game.

If you look at the way both CoH and SWG have designed their quest creation tools you could see them working. They are eazy to understand, give rewards for building and completing and it doesn't take a level designing genius to make a fun one.

Other tools can be worked the same way. Make them less technical and more fun and people will use them.

Kyleran

So hard to judge, but it has to be entertaining enough to make it worth my sub fee.

EVE 2.75 yrs and counting, some only a month or two, a couple were 18 mo-2.5 yrs.

I may not know how much content is enough, but I certainly can tell when a game doesn't have much.

 

Briansho

I don't know about content but people seem to like the "carrot on a stick" flashy item concept lately. Gotta chase that next shiny new item and show it off to everyone, who all have the exact same item.