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Samzagas
Member UncommonPosts: 22
I've always wondered why in mmos, everyone has a nametag above their heads. There is no game(well, perhaps there are some) in wich you can avoid having your name floating over you. Have you ever considered how stupid this is?
I'll put an example with a popular mmo, WOW, you can't sneak around correctly, they won't see you hidden the the bush, but they will notice your name floating over it. Same goes for druids, a druid in it's flight form can land and stay put, looking like a part of the enviroment exept, of course, because there's a name floating above it wich gives you away!
I also want to point out that that's unreal that we know the name of everyone in the world, even enemies! How come I know the name of someone who I've never seen before, nor I've ever heard about? I really despite that fact. When you go around the city, you should see everyone as "elf" or "human" or "orc", not as "Corellon", "Gandalf" and "Grumsh", exapt, of course, if you knew them beforehand.
Anyway, I was just ranting and I wish to know what you think about it, feel free to express yourselves.
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I liked your idea,maybe if you get to know the player and you add him to your friend list you can see his name.
(no point sneaking up to a friend to pk him)
Basically clicking away text windows ruins every MMO, try to have fun instead of rushing things. Without story and lore all there is left is a bunch of mechanics.
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Darkfall doesnt show a name until you literally mouse over aka target that player.
II think any pvP focused game pretty much NEEDS the nametag hidden.
True, but it shouldn't show the actually name, if you haven't met the person before.
And true again, pvp NEEDS the nametag hidden, althou, I'd appreciated even in pve games
When I see someone in real life, even if I just walk by him in a city, I can tell him apart from all the other humans in the city. It's very rare that two persons would look so exactly similar, that you couldn't tell the diffirence with just a glance. And if I walk by same person regularly, I learn to recognize him and remember him, even if I've never spoken a word to him.
When I play an MMO, the screen resolution is bad, and the same textures and models are used and reused on characters. It's easy to tell the character's sex and race, but it's really hard to tell a character apart from all other characters with same sex and race. If it were't for the nametag, I wouldn't learn to recognize players I see regularly. With nametags it's possible.
It would be great if nametags were designed to not to show when you don't see the character. But even if that is not done, nametags increase the realism of games.
Indeed, but that's because you see them regularly and you pay attention to them, but even when you do so, you don't know the name. A more realistic situation, would tag the characters by their looks, "the brawny, white haired human" and "the small, agile halfling" instead of their actual names.
It wouldn't be so bad if there were more MMO's that had a more diverse character creation mode. Earth and Beyond's ship designer, CoX, and CO to some extent do that to a decent level.
For instance, in CoH, I could identify supergroups more readily by the guilds color combos or unique attire. Hell I could even spot my friends just by their unique outfits and associated their outfits to their names. I guess the key word here is "Unique". When most MMO's have a static 10 hairstyles, faces, 5 skin colors, 10 accessories and not even adjustable height or bulk while reliant on wearing a jumble of stat gear or EQ/WoW-esque common epic gear (oxymoron isn't it?) the only way you can tell orc A from orc B from a distance is how long their nametag is when it's not mixed in with everyone elses above their heads.
Yeah I know, guild capes... but the only time you see them is when they're running away or taking a dirt nap, so kinda pointless for ID'ing anyways.
But honestly, when you think of Superman, Spider Man, Maxx, The Tick and Arthur... and so on, you know the outfits and even the alternate variations of costumes.
Hell more to the point... Venture Bros. #21 and #24. They wear the same costume and color but can identify them by physical appearance and voice. They don't need f'ing nametags above their heads.
"There is only one thing of which I am certain, and that's nothing is certain."
Well, so you can tell who they are. It can be difficult to tell people apart on physical appearance in most MMOs.
The fact that WoW implements it badly doesn't invalidate the concept. In Final Fantasy XI, when you're invisible, your name tag is invisible too.
You want the game to keep track of everybody you know or don't know just so it can not show you the names of the people you don't know? That strikes me as a poor use of limited server resources.
1.- That's true, but only because we still don't have the perfect graphics engine. But we don't need it, instead of having a huge array of armors witch are always better than before, and none can explain why they don't get mass produced and shipped to other town, we could try having the same huge array, but of clothing, of different styles and colors witch you can match and make your unique appearance! I'll be about tweaking the system and enchanting the items, plate gives more defence than clothing, but all plate give the same ammount, you have to enchant them to further increase their power.
2.-I used WOW as an example only, and even there, your nametag dissapears when you sneak. I mean that no matter in what game, if you can sit and hide in the bush, or behind the small wall, there shouldn't be a nametag giving you away, just because you are no rogue/ninja/whatevs and you don't have the special skill! If it completely covers you from their line of sight, then it's only logical to assume that they shouldn't see you.
3.-I'm no programmer, but I think that a few flags plus some triggers to turn them on and off could do the trick. And it would take even less server resources than the ludicrous "achievement" system that most games have nowadays.
When I played DAoC what was floating above enemies heads was their race and pvp rank (on the ffa pvp server it was still their name, I think)
You only saw their name when you did or took damage or when someone got killed you could also see who killed them.
Many learned to recognize their favorite targets or their most feared opponent though. By how they moved, by where they roamed and by how they looked.
As far as friendlies I had their names turned off, and recognized them by how they moved and how they had coloured their armor and weapons.. plus there were tailoring patterns for pointy hats that combined with a bright colour could help identify a raid leader or something... plus being able to make macro's to /target friendlies by name and /face them made it fairly easy to find someone of importance on your own side.... WoW made part of that into a graphical interface for raids.
Still, while playing DAoC we often discussed how dumb it was that you couldnt hide behind a tree or in a bush, because of something floating above your head. And how if that was your name floating there it would make sense to have as short a name as possible so it wouldnt stick out at either side of the tree you were hiding behind.
I guess my point is, I dont need to have the enemies name floating above them, Often its even too hard to make out individual names or titles in the sea of letters above the heads of an enemy force. And any benefits are far outweighed by the logic of being able to hide in spite of having a name thats more than 6 letters long.
DAOC has had it that way since launch for cross faction stuff (RVR). You would see their race and their realm rank (i.e. Firbolg Brehon instead of Toughguy). If attacked it would tell you who you were killing (real name in chat) but not on the screen. It gave the feeling that you were part of a whole when competing end game and not just Iwannapwnjoo or Urmomstinks.
Each game I play I immediately turn off the name-display. Saves FPS and I think it's annoying to see names floating. You won't see/know everyone's name IRL either when you go outside...
Playing LotR now and (as said above) I've turned off the floating names. When I move my mouse over will a player, I will see their name (as well as class & kinship) in a small box.