I hope someone from Bioware is reading this more than ncsoft. TOR is supposedly going to be the heaviest story based MMORPG yet from what I've heard. Will be interesting to see if thats what players really want, or if that's what tanks the game. I havent looked at GW2 very much, thought the PVE of GW1 was way to bland and boring. This is the first article I've read that has made me more interested in researching that game. thx
I hated GW1, uninstalled in 2 days ( and I never do that, things sit on my HD forever, just in case). But I am really looking forward to GW2. They are planning some true innovations, and if they can deliver everything they are promising, it will be an amazing game.
the only MMO's ive played where i felt i was a part of a story was Shadowbaneand Fallen Earth. this was not so because of anything the game devs wanted, but because you could play the games largely as you wanted.
stories that suck you in can only take the form of active player generated uncontrolled content. events that really happen in response to other events that really happen. following premade lore from point A to point B is not a story. its just a time hog while you miles and miles across largely empty territory to get to the next mini vid or wall of text...the only excitment you feel will be if you get attacked by a random pk, or some upexpected monsters. i could write books about the narrative that i fought through in shadowbane because it was truly unfolding. huge political events cast regional shadows affecting everyone in the area.
true potential for change is what defines good story telling, most MMO story telling consists of poorly written simple quests that never deviate from their simple parameters, "kill the 10 burly troggs, forever and ever" etc
@ wingman i take it your a casual gammer coz the only people who just want to play at mindless grinding are causal gamers. have u actually read the developers notes on their site the npcs do react to your presance and the world around them. also they have covered what i think should have been done in that the world still moves regarless if you are there or not. as the old saying goes time waits for no man.
"Once upon a time there when the land was at peace, there was a a wizard that betrayed his best friend (both went to a magic academy). Yhe best friend turned him in and the acadamy cast the would be wizard out of the academy. The dark wizard soandso as he was later named disappered and re-emerged a century later having gathered other dark wizards employing a dark army with the attempt to take over the world. Then the great war happened.
The war was so destructive that it nearly destroyed the world (Something like a nuclear world war). Those that were able to sought refuge within the earth. Now a hundred years after the magic of the world has become intuned again, the inhabitants of the earth have begun to resurface. What they don't know is that not all of the inhabitants found solice in the Earth.
Those that did not die from the remnants of the dark and light magic that continued to battle against each other long after their casters were dead, were changed. Some good, some bad. Even those hidden in the earth were slowly changed, as one thing affects another.
Prophecy has been kind. It has seen fit not to completely destroy mankind. The heavens have granted the world a second chance. Now a thousand years later as you emerge from the safety of the underground village you once called home, your eyes are awakened to a world you never knew existed.
It is up to you now to fufill prophecy and your destiny and reinvent the world. You are the chosen and how you will live your life on New Earth from here is up to you. Will you seek the the ancient secrets of the dark that once threatened to destroy all of mankind, or will you embrace the light and help to resurrect the idead of peace that once ruled the world.
How the world becomes is now up to you...
The choice is yours."
A base storyline. Easy enough. Some scattered inhabitants here and there etc.. From here on out, the storyline is shaped by us. The storyline is written by the player's actions. New cities and towns emerge slowly over time. As players frequent certain areas, those towns start to grow. The more players visit an area, the quicker a town grows. Have instanced quests that will shape the storyline. Allow players to complete epic battles that never repeat, meaning that if boss badass spawns (a dark wizard resurrected an evil spirit into the flesh) and is killed, the players that resurrected him/her are written in the storyline/history as the ones that did it (they would have to overcome some serious obsticles to do so, or maybe good players ignorantly triggered events of magic gone wrong or found a medallion that activated the event, etc..), The of course those that quelled the mr badass are written into the storyline/history. Maybe mr badass appears again but not for quite a very long time. In the meantime there is never a shortage of players themselves vieing to take over the world or save it.
So really, just start with a vague storyline. If the deves are smart, they'll let the players make the rest up as they go. Saves from having spend 5 years making up an entire world's history that most players will probably never bother with. Also, this would cause players to interact more and rely on each other more as it was meant to be. Players can become enthralled in the storyline because they "are" the storyline.
No auction houses (until later), not insta travle to the enemies doorstep ("most" of that sort of magic is yet to be discovered), And make it a skill/level based class system for which there is no end. No endgame.
I always thought the major issue with mmorpgs storylines is how well the intergrate you the player into them.
I find nothing more annoying than finding that every class / race is treated identically for example a Paladin being told t go off and slaughter peacful fairies for his class armour or any race visiting its home town and being treated the same as all the other races.
Inorder to grow storytelling in mmorpgs needs to take into account the characeter specifics a elf visiting the elven city should be greeted as a hero returning to the fold whilst a orc visiting should eb treated with suspicion or even out right hostility (falling short of being attacked) Of course EQ1 handled this fairly well by having city factions and allowing players to work their faction.
But, we the players also need to grow up a bit. If you do not read the quest dialog don't complain about lack of story. Its never just go and kill 10 rats there is always a reason and sometimes those reasons are pretty good.
Final note perhaps the biggest failing is the ease of menu selection in the past EQ1 had key words inside the quest dialog these keywords were then used to find more information. It encourged you the player to engage the npc in dialog inorder too find what he knew and get the quest offered. This got you involved in the story and hooked you. You did not know what the reward would be you did not have a silver line or huge question mark/ exclamantion point. You talked to every npc you made notes you hunted for clues.
I remember the early days and the quest for the Soulfire sword in EQ1. It started (at least for me) with a quest to prove myself a knight. This quest started around level 1 finaly conculded in a epic fight with a corrupt captain of the guard. Through out the quest was multiple story lines all linked togather to make a massive quest chain.
Thats what mmorpgs need storylines which hook you in and drag you through quests which you do for the story and the rewards at the end are something which more often than not reminds you of the story even more thasn their own intrensic value as a tool.
First, well-written & interesting article and best still, great points of view all above.
Story in MMO needs to apprehend two things at the beginning.
1. MMO major enjoyment needs to be the fighting mechanic, communication options, level of detail in the world that appears autonomous to the player. If all these are flexible enough then simple playability/ repetitive/repeatable actions can be done successfully/enjoyable with or without a good story.
2. The story has to link with this aspect of the game in a way that (continiously) grows the story.
Some of the problems to achieve this:
1. New Avatars must be limited, specific OR choices that defines the type of story more bespoke to this genesis so it is more personal and cogent to the class/race/creed etc. Too much choice is is no choice ie generic.
2. Storylines do not result in choices closing other potential stories that lead to other types of gameplay. This gives value/judgement to player choices and makes how the story grows affect how the player plays the game (as much as vica-versa!).
3. Player gameplay does not change the world - so the story cannot therefore continue to grow or mean anything other than levelling.
4. Static world with not enough events initiated deus ex to produce a sense of a world that is outside and greater than the influence of the player. 5. Player reputation from choices is the way the player has grown through the story and how any sentient creature should deal/ treat with the player as another consequence.
So story could expand the rewards of players ingame to consist of:
1. Power (this is partly done with level/gear/pvp ability 2. Social Influence that affects those under the banner of said player .3. Factor X let's call the last strand: The rarest of all abilities that the player has the ability to indirectly alter/shape or guide changes to the game-world.
Conclude: A lot of this has not been possible with game worlds to date, a lot requires a better conception of how story can be used in games and much depends on players' demand for this sort of aspect being increasingly developed for MMO's and accepting greater levels of player inequality but also greater diversity of endings to stories for newly created Avatars. Most players will be able to achieve 1. power for their avatar, only a few will achieve 2. power over other avatars and the rarest would effect power to change the very game and the story of everyone else, for good or for bad!!
This is the reason why I'm always dissapointed by MMOs. I think stories are what drives me to play games. good mechanics are almost as important but if the story is amazing I'll be in it for the long haul even if the gameplay is a little thin. It seems to me that this open ended social genre needs to somehow weave the story into the real time action in a more direct way. possibly through advances in AI technology. Or maybe if the players had better tools to role play there could be more visceral realistic story telling going on in game.
A good story can immerse a player/listener, evoking reactions and emotions to the particular context of the story at that given moment: Fear at some hideous monster, laughter at some erudite wordplay or joke, resentment at some trickery or betrayal etc. These are then forks in our avatar/hero's journey: Runaway or fight! Laugh or 1up! double or quits! etc etc... that all (hopefully) lead to real consequences of the players' decisions. The lowest consequences would be a simple money or material reward or item, a higher reward would be to want to see where the story leads on in further forks and splits (The road less travelled)... and maybe even higher up, would be the players' reactions/decisions changing the very world of the story itself!
So story has a lot to offer games as long as it's told really well and the gameplay itself also adds back into the story tale itself. Perhaps that's what GW2 Dynamic events and SWOR personal crew of NPC friends are both trying to achieve?
story only has alot to offer single player games, a story in an mmo is that of the player charecter, its really that simple, if you take the players ability to create their own story away from them and give them a linear main game story arc, your essentialy adding an ending to your supposedly endless mmo.
like other posters have already stated, an mmo is a world an ongoing none stop breathing living world full of real people playing charecters, you cannot hit save and shut the system down and wait till you turn it back on again to play, the mmo is always in play, events are allways unfolding, so how can you restrict players to a story line if the world the story is in keeps going while the story the player is following stops while he sleeps, the answer is this, if you do your game is not going to be as good as it can be as an mmo. for instance as some one else has already said, linear quest lines are the same for every single player, that means every single person that plays the game must do the same exact quests as the other players, so when players want to create their own story all they have as reference is the main story arcs they had to sit through when they started to play.
a story always ends. all stories end, can any one who posts on here think of a single story that doesnt have an ending ??? if you can i would like to know about it please!
its bad business to have an mmo with an ending, again like some one else has already said above, when the story ends their is nothing to do so players unsubscribe, this is as true as it can ever be, i always unsubscribe when ive reached the end of the games story content.
reason - nothing else to do other than make another charecter and sit through all the same exact quests again and grind up levels.
i propose questing on a whole be simplified and developer story be completely removed,
the only place i would expect a story driven mmo is in a themed mmo, but even then it would need some reigning in. story should never drive and mmo. sure story defines the peramiters of the game and the feel and sets the pace and depth for emersion. but story doesn t bring about emersion. players bring about emersion by emersing into the content of the game, the story is the theme and back drop from which the players feed of to fuel their own personal stories and identities in the game.
those players that like to grind levels and run dungeons will have very little value for either and will just grind the quests grind the levels get the best geer and pvp himself into a oblivious bordom before moving onto the next mmo title that tickles their fancy.
the vast majority of gamers want content and depth and want to be able to get involved in the games structure. stories dont allow this. a story is like a highway. a road full of cars going from A TO B.
i feel the story should be told at the start of the gamewhen you irst create your charec ter so the players are aware of the world and its main focuss then the story should stop and allow th eplayers to continue the story as they see fit. sure quests guide the players through the games but the quests should not tell the story and lead to an inevitable end. end means closure and closure means time to move to a new game because this one is now boreing and ive completed it.
lol i just completed this mmo, it just sounds so wrong!
story only has alot to offer single player games, a story in an mmo is that of the player charecter, its really that simple, if you take the players ability to create their own story away from them and give them a linear main game story arc, your essentialy adding an ending to your supposedly endless mmo.
So when you add a story to MMO, you take away the story of the player character?
I can assure you you can have both and fairly easily in fact, lol
Using LOL is like saying "my argument sucks but I still want to disagree".
The problem with having the players 'be the story' is that the developers then completely skimp on the world design. I am primarily referring to sandboxes. It becomes sterile. The developers need to work on a RPG infrastructure that the players can partake in and the pre-written snippets of dialogue will shape around their actions, choices, affiliations and locations and use facts like their size, age, name, scars, profession etc to give colour to your NPC actions.
the idea behind sandbox is to encourage a players imagination to create vibrant ingame content useing their own personality. its like online gameing with player controlled props.
wow is a game that uses npc props, al you do is follow quests guidelines and directions untill you have best items and armour then pvp untill your drawling with boredom before you quit playing.
sandbox offers the players a chance to indulge them selves by utilizeing the freedom of the game worlds mechanics.
what we mean by players being the story is, players creating their own story within the game world, this doesnt mean making their own quests and such.
all mmo's need a guide and theme to drive the player to diffrent areas to unlock diffrent aspects of the game, some mmo's take this literally like lorto and wow, these games are very quest intensive to the point you cannot progress unless you complete the quests in a specific level restricted order, sandbox essentialy removes the must and must nots and the do's and do nots and simply allows the player to progress hwo he wants to progress and dabble in what ever he/she feels like dabbling in.
take eve online for example. to start off its a very good idea to run the game tutorial from start to finish to get a basic understanding, but learning the gaes mechanics is not what the games about, eve has a bac story, but the game its self is created and run by the players. its practically 100% player driven, just because it doesnt have a story defined by the game granted by a mechanic given by an npc doesnt mean the stories are not present. in eve their is a story to be told potentially from every single player that speant more than a month in eve. these are not stories based of his charecter progression but stories based of his experiences in the game world. eve is so free realm that just flying round will inevitably lead to some excitement and exhilerateing experiences. its inevitable that some where along the lines of playign eve that a player will experience something that will grant him/her with an epic tale to tell to other players.
ive been their ive done and ive seen hundreds of other players experience the same thing, and its truely brilliant the way eve works.
i havnt seen this sort of thing in any other mmorpg, because all stories you hear from players are based of the quests and dungeons they have run, and not of simply going about their daily business and routines. i think this is what people refer to when they say player stories!!!
i for one hate being confined to the chlostrophobic confines of a linear story line which will eventually lead me to end game content and canceling my subs because their is nothing else to do.
the best example of this is guild wars, from start to the end you do missions. the last mission = end. once its all over what do you do ???? make a new charecter and run all those exact same quests again and again and read and hear the same old story???? no ofcourse you dont, you indulge in a little pvp then get bored then you change game. most mmo's retain their players for roughly 8 months to a maximum of 2 years on a whole before the player moves along, the majority of players are done with a game after the first year, it shouldnt be possible to clock an mmo and experience all it has to offer ever.
mmo's need to be consistant and ongoing, they need to feel realistic. single player games are for endings mmo's are for experiences.
I disagree, that a good story can be crafted for players is mutually exclusive of an open-world game system where the design of the game leads and enhances player interactions where story naturally emerges from this interaction. EG Eve by report fits this mold. In fact in my above post you see the "rewards" that a good story can enhance 2. Player interactions.
If the World PvP system in Guild Wars works (using your example) then this also could result in a tigher player interactions for all sides that leads to in-game stories of daring-do, tactics and planning and close-shaves and glory as emergent stories from the players that is not scripted (my preferred gameplay). But this is not exclusive of a player story that has complex webs of causation crafted in with multiple destinations depending on the player's choices, gameplay and player/NPC interactions. It looks like this is exactly what GW2 and Bioware especially with SWOR are both trying to achieve. After a story ends, you say, the game is over, but what lingers in the memory, might be the start of another story?!
Very nice article, I just started back to coming to this site 2 nights ago, even though I've never posted before. But I like this article. Makes me think and motivates me to work on my story telling more when involving multiple side side stories that tie into the big picture.
the idea behind sandbox is to encourage a players imagination to create vibrant ingame content useing their own personality. its like online gameing with player controlled props.
take eve online for example. to start off its a very good idea to run the game tutorial from start to finish to get a basic understanding, but learning the gaes mechanics is not what the games about, eve has a bac story, but the game its self is created and run by the players. its practically 100% player driven, just because it doesnt have a story defined by the game granted by a mechanic given by an npc doesnt mean the stories are not present. in eve their is a story to be told potentially from every single player that speant more than a month in eve. these are not stories based of his charecter progression but stories based of his experiences in the game world. eve is so free realm that just flying round will inevitably lead to some excitement and exhilerateing experiences. its inevitable that some where along the lines of playign eve that a player will experience something that will grant him/her with an epic tale to tell to other players.
ive been their ive done and ive seen hundreds of other players experience the same thing, and its truely brilliant the way eve works.
i for one hate being confined to the chlostrophobic confines of a linear story line which will eventually lead me to end game content and canceling my subs because their is nothing else to do.
You are mistaken if you think eve online is a true sandbox. The developers have been caught before with their fingers in the cookie jar rigging things in favor of their friends and having rigged endings to their roleplaying event arcs. It's not a sandbox if the story is railroaded. And I doubt players stuck on the side written to lose no matter what would be pleased that they are wasting their time and ingame assets on being losers, just because the developers said so. That is the exact same linear story line you claim to hate.
Now see... I'm just against needing to have a storyline. When, in any world, has the future been so laid out, so predictable, so boring? I ask because a really great game doesn't need a great story... it needs a playerbase that can handle doing something for nothing.
I admit, it's kinda silly to perform a quest and have a Smiting Sword handed to you AFTER it's complete. Why didn't he hand it to you before the battle, after all, his daughter's life was on the line, right???
I would be quite happy knowing that the reason I am even existing in a virtual world is that there are antagonists that might need culling. If I am chaotic, than the view would change to suit the reason to exist.
One person wrote that Story's end...I beg to differ... I cannot think of one story that could not have an alternate "ending". If that be true, than a story could continue infinitely. Millions of gamers have already proven this by sticking with their favorite game for years. People flocked from game to game because of these three reasons: Graphics, Mechanics, End-Game
The storyline is going to be overlooked for the sake of those three reasons. I don't need a reason to save the Mayor's daughter from the mutated kobold. I just want to challenge the Kobold because it's there. You can tie that battle into whatever story you want. The challenge doesn't lie in how I affect the story because I already know that I do not affect the story. The story is already told, it's been weighed, and completed. No matter how many times you allow me to challenge that Kobold, saving the Mayor's daughter has no meaning... it's all about being able to survive in a situation with hopes that my reward is found in the belly of the beast at hand.
I don't care for NPC rewards. But, if thats the story being told, I guess I gotta take the sword from the guy after the fact that it would have been much more useful before.
As far as the game ending because a story ended... I can honestly say that I believe that is a cop-out or way-out for whomever feels that way. A story is the past, tomorrow is unkown, and today is our chance to turn the story. No RPG can capture the imagination of a human mind...not even the brilliant minds that create the games we play.
I don't see how you can properly tell a story in a persistant world. The problem is, as mentioned above, how many times will dragon X respawn for player Z to kill. The only solution to this seems to be instances but then again this goes against the nature of MMOs and we don't want our MMOs instanced only to have a proper story.
And about the briefer quest texts? Why would you want to have all the important stuff put in 2 lines when you have map markers and stuff. That extra bit of information is just fluff and what some players enjoy to read. It doesn't really matter that it will slow you down. I don't see why would I care about the time I spent to get to max level the first time through. On my alts I skip the wall of text and rush my char to max level
I think story is important in an MMO but I don't think it needs to be a linear story. I also think story can be in a sandbox type MMO, but more in the form of a background, not something that limits the players.
The problem I see with sandboxes is if you leave everything to the players problems arise. I started MMOs in UO and from the beginning I thought that game was fantastic. At first I didn't even mind the PKing, but after about 4 days of dying/respawning/loosing all my loot to PKs I did get frustrated and almost quit the game. Then I met a group of people who were protecting newbies and running off the PKs and I decided to keep playing. I eventually got better at the game and joined thier guild and found myself later doing the same as they did for me. I felt like that was my personal story and it was fun to roleplay the protector of the innocent.
While it worked out for me I know many people who tried UO and left do to rampant PKing that the game had. That is the main problem I see when anyone talks about allowing the players to control their own stories. I don't have a problem with PvP, my problem is with the griefers and my fear is that any purely sandbox MMO is going to be plauged by them.
I think that if they made an MMO that took what UO was, and added further things like building cities, sieging cities, a player economy based soley on crafting, basically all the best ideas from UO and SWG and then found a way to deal with the griefing, then you would be onto something.
Furthermore since when developing this game you are only making the back story, you could take the money saved from hiring writers and instead pay people to do live game events, IE Hobgoblins attacking such and such town.
Anyway those are just some of my ramblings. I may just have to compile all my thought and make a serious post on what is needed for a sandbox MMO.
Vanilla WoW actually had some really great storylines. Most of them were side stories, but a few were epic in scope and immersive in terms of participating in the drama of the main storyline.
I was very sad to see so many stories ended with the expansions, and I'm kind of afraid of the retconning Blizzard will do to make the lore work in the next expansion. Bringing back dead bad guys gets old... =/
The problem I see is that everyone of them follows the old manthra of you adventurer's are good guys here is a quest you need to help with. What if I want to be a bad guy? I am not talking WoW style horde or alliance, I mean what if I want to help out the LK and destroy people who are going to raid his emerging evilness? So the problem is that it will still be linear as in there is a clear deffined good guy and bad guy and we normally fall in to the catagory of good guy.
Jaedor agree with you, Vanilla WoW had excellent stories back then which got dumbed down because people wanted an easier experience. Take for example the Onixia chain of quest that was a great story, but later on no new people wanted to do it, they just wanted to get to end game to raid with there budies. And then you had the individual quest for classes that had great potential but with expansions coming out no one cared about that back story it did not interface at all with the new content.
What I believe they should do is make it relevant at all times but make it an option for those that wish to be part of the story. Take for example the Rogue quest where you had to do something to get into a certain group. Or the lock or pally quest for the epic mount all good stories that where eventually taken out because people thought they where too hard.
So a lot of games start out ok on the story lines and are then irelevent after an expansion comes out and developers dont even try. It is the same with TV shows most of the time, in the US they do a season and if it does ok they do another and another and once it does not they cut the show leaving you with a what just happen they did not finish the story. The UK style is a bit better they pitch a show and they say I want to do 4 seasons worth of show and this is how we are going to end it, so they actually have a conclusion to the current story line. Can they do more seasons after that? Heck yeah they just expand on some of what they had to continue the story in a new direction.
Runstal good point that you bring up but most people do not roleplay so they do not really care, the whole live event would be great. The one thing that was cool that WoW did prior to the WotLK coming out was the one time event of the invasion of the undead where you could get infected. It was something new that they did, there was no temporary events other than the schedule holiday events. If they did more of this it would be great, let out Onyxia out of her cave and wonder the contry side destroying people with a bunch of dragons make it something epic. Have Onixia destroy a town that you have to help rebuild.
Ataka you bring up some very good points. It seems that they do not think they have anything meaninful to give if they do not present some kind of linear way for you to progress. This takes away from the game for some people and it ruins the experience. Some are there because they want to be and if a monster comes around they just want to kill it, if there was some maiden or what ever they saved then fine but if not who cares lol. And very well about being unable to capture the imagination of the human mind. So my earlier input would be a good one, you should be able to say no I am not going to rescue the daughter as a mater of fact I am going to go and see if I can get more money or something from the trolls or whoever stole the daughter.
If they could come up with something similar to Fable I think they would have something really good, I did not play the game but your choices meant something. Most of the time you are limited by the choices. I will say what I did in the last thread about story issues, if you tell X NPC you will help and kill those 10 rats there should be repercussions like you can get another quest from some one else, so your story about what a good guy you are gets told do others and they in turn trust you, or you decide to drop the quest and say screw this I dont want to kill 10 rats, well that should have a repercussion as well and it should be reflected in how you are treated by other NPC's. So same goes for GW2 if you are there during the dynamic event and you decide you will do nothing then you should not be rewarded for being around, hell you should have the option of helping out the attacking trolls or what ever is attacking cause you decided you dont want to be a good guy, and who is to say that the villagers are good guys to begin with? What if they decided to build the town or village or whatever over a troll burial ground or something? Yes I know I am making it more complicated but still.
The standard story in MMO's appears at a glance like a todo list or a grocery list. Do these things; once done, go here. After that task is completed move on to a new area and repeat with slight tweaks to the appearance. The story goes down the list forever and on and on.
What I think would be beneficial to the story system is to give the players a feel like they are writing the story or the content, without the hassel and directionlessness of actually doing that. When I say that, I mean if an army is attacking a town, the mayor says go to the nearby fort and get us some help, you go complete it. Then the army mobilizes to defend the town, the guard doesn't have to tell you "hey lets go kick their ass!" the army actually goes and does it, and you want to go with them to get in on the action. The player feels like they decided to go do that and got rewarded for it, and if they say I'm gonna ditch this series, it's ok, and they did their part then left.
the story will move with the player and be open to pick and choose, it is more appealing
Story is overrated because we have always had story in mmos and in other types of games. The first 2 games that come to midn right away when you talk about story is Diablo rpgs and Guild Wars. Those games had story and cinematics that told you the story and happening of the world around you. Developers need to focus on better gameplay mechanics rather than mess with story so much. I like story but I don't see what the big deal is when we have always had it ?
I disagree with UsualSuspect's assertion that stories must have an ending. As they say the ending is just the beginning. In books all we see is one segment of the characters' overall story. Where the book ends often times more tales will take place(or would if the world continued to 'live' after the author was 'done' writing the book/series).
However, it is true that with how 'epic' many games or even books get there eventually comes a point where you just can't up the ante anymore. I mean where do you go after you have defeated the Lord of despair the source of all evil[or some such]? Saving a farm from bandits doesn't really seem like the next progression or exciting considering at that point you are practically a god yourself.
That said you can probably guess that I would rather see a story where the players are more or less wandering mercenaries. Yeah sometimes you may be involved in the rise and fall of kingdoms, but much of your adventures would be more mundane. This story could go on indefinitely.
As for a quest only doable once as Serajin stated "If I resuced the Mayors daughter, thats it. No other player should have that "quest" available to them - ever (even new players to the server). The world moves on."
I must disagree. First of all I must admit I play to play the whole game. I don't like it when I can't access some content for whatever reason. But thinking about The 4th Coming is an MMORPG that had one quest that was done interestingly. You mention a Mayor's Daughter being kidnapped, well in T4C there was a bishop who needed healed because he was poisoned. If you were a well doer you had to heal him. But what to do if someone already healed him? Well you see the not so well doers would poison him. As for why he kept getting poisoned? Well I guess he just really loved his Apples . What type of Bishop can't resist temptation?! Tsk Tsk.
So in that vein someone who fights for justice may receive notice that the mayor of X village is in dire need because his daughter has been kidnapped by this bandit who wishes to force her to become his bride. The ally of justice rushes in and frees her, returning her to her father. However, The bandit may not be content with just giving up and he starts searching for someone to kidnapp her and bring him to her. Clearly this would be a job a not so well doer could take up.
Like in T4C quests and the choices you make during them could add 'points' to an alignment score. If a certain score is achieved you can access certain quests. Unlike T4C my personal preference would be a less set path(T4C had a rather clear good/evil divide) and a very wide variety of quests that access many different options. For example perhaps when kidnapping the mayor's daughter you learn that she wishes to explore the world and would reward you if you let her go at the next town. Thus, the next well doer would learn that the Daughter was kidnapped, but when you bust up the bandits camp you find out that the mercenary had ran off with her(and thus you have to track her down to the town she was left at and drag her back to her father). Or something like that. Like in some T4C quests a timer could be added. This way if you take too long the mayor/bandit would hire a more competent mercenary. Etc.
As I ramble just let me say that I find a powerful story to be a must, I can actually overlook poor game mechanics if the story is good enough(though the game must still be 'playable'). However, the converse is also true, excellent game mechanics can bring me in even if the story is very very bad. But to qualify as an excellent game it must reach a certain level in both fields in my opinion.
I agree and disagree on whether sotyline is more or less important than mechanics. I think that if both are implimented correctly, the two should go hand in hand creating deeper immersion and a more enjoyable experience. If old man farmer says he will pay me 1 gold per rat I kill on his land because they are destroying his crops, for which the local palace rely on for some of thier food... great. But if I agree and then find out that regardless of whether I kill the rats or not, the palace never actually runs out of said item (because the devs never atually made this part of the game mechanic), then really the long drawn out storyline just for some low level rats is negate and has no real value to the player exept as a grindfest for gold. Completing the quest will not impact any part of the game whatsoever and the player is not in fact helping anyone or harming if they refuse. If the outcome doesn't actually inpact the game world (or at least that area/region), then really why bother with a long drawn out explination. Save the resouces for something in the game that does count. and just have old man farmer say. "I'll pay you 1 gold for every rat you kill because I hate rats"...the end.
Voice over.. I'd rather hear it than read it anyday. When STO has Spock talking when you are exploring a new area.. I mute my voice-chat and listen. His voice is so compelling... the voice adds a layer of immersion that makes the player open to listening... or wanting to listen.
MMOs suffer the 'repeating quest' syndrome.. where the story gets repeated a dozen or more times (with small variants) so that you actually start training yourself to phase-out the story so that you can just 'get the goods' you came here to get.... having to do the quest 6 to 10 times because the MMO reward system is based on 'quest tokens'. Take SWG Heroic instances... 8x each for most x 5 x 4 = 160 iterations of the same 5 stories over and over again.
The 'repeatable quest' concept absolutely demolishes the storytelling expertience.. players cannot phase out and into content so easily once they are 'trained' to skip the dialogue.
Its worse when its multi-player and 1 or more of those players have already 'done' the quest on a previous character. They want to push forward and will often leave you standing alone if you don't "just skip it.. press OK already".
BIOWARE with TOR stories and voice immersion looks like they are going to make a serious run a getting players & their characters more involved in the story than just item questing. Full voiceover.. multiple stories based not only on character type but also previous actions.. and companion NPC 'behavior' influence as well.
US players.. you and me.. who have trained ourselves to ignore the story will need to 'unlearn what we have learned' in order to truely enjoy the increadible stories that the developers poor hundreds of hours into making.. while we breeze past it in a 4 hour 'power session'.
In MMO's its good to SLOW DOWN and smell the roses... in fact, the times I've enjoyed MMO play the most is when I've not been under any sort of pressure to 'catch up' or join the 'min/max' group for end-content PvP.
For TOR... I am going to take my time.. and really listen to the story... because thats a big reason why I play the game in the first place.
You may have a point about having a good story. I do not recant waht I've said earlier, but having come from viewing a movie, The Sorcerer's Apprentice I found myself immersed because of the story and over-looked the cheesey side-show for it.
It wasn't the main story that got my attention, it was the backstory. In MMOGs, the back story is huge, it's stuffed down your mouth and tastes rather bland at times. I spent three days in the Scarlet Monestary of WoW just to read all the books laying around. Those books were hidden gems that told a story I could appreciate.
The main story in most MMOs is similar to saying steak is steak no matter where it's served. So untrue. All these characters with some delimma is driving me insane. I mean, how many sons or daughters must avenge the death of their parent? How many times must we here that Elves sold magic for shining trinkets? How many generations have we waited for you to come along, the chosen one?
In the movie, TSA, myths and legends came together for a incredible cause. My part was to assist the protagonist to his destiny, in spite of his lack of experience, unwillingness and casual approach to what should have been the greatest honor achievable by any mage/sage.
In one game, the hardcore players were left in awe as a casual player named Tim The Enchanter had his name etched into stone within the game. A forever marking that allowed me to endeavor regardless of the other stories around me.
I want the story to take me from a vagabond to a hero, as well as making my accomplishment a living part of the story. Then, I wouldn't be here writing, now would I?
Comments
I hated GW1, uninstalled in 2 days ( and I never do that, things sit on my HD forever, just in case). But I am really looking forward to GW2. They are planning some true innovations, and if they can deliver everything they are promising, it will be an amazing game.
the only MMO's ive played where i felt i was a part of a story was Shadowbaneand Fallen Earth. this was not so because of anything the game devs wanted, but because you could play the games largely as you wanted.
stories that suck you in can only take the form of active player generated uncontrolled content. events that really happen in response to other events that really happen. following premade lore from point A to point B is not a story. its just a time hog while you miles and miles across largely empty territory to get to the next mini vid or wall of text...the only excitment you feel will be if you get attacked by a random pk, or some upexpected monsters. i could write books about the narrative that i fought through in shadowbane because it was truly unfolding. huge political events cast regional shadows affecting everyone in the area.
true potential for change is what defines good story telling, most MMO story telling consists of poorly written simple quests that never deviate from their simple parameters, "kill the 10 burly troggs, forever and ever" etc
@ wingman i take it your a casual gammer coz the only people who just want to play at mindless grinding are causal gamers. have u actually read the developers notes on their site the npcs do react to your presance and the world around them. also they have covered what i think should have been done in that the world still moves regarless if you are there or not. as the old saying goes time waits for no man.
"Once upon a time there when the land was at peace, there was a a wizard that betrayed his best friend (both went to a magic academy). Yhe best friend turned him in and the acadamy cast the would be wizard out of the academy. The dark wizard soandso as he was later named disappered and re-emerged a century later having gathered other dark wizards employing a dark army with the attempt to take over the world. Then the great war happened.
The war was so destructive that it nearly destroyed the world (Something like a nuclear world war). Those that were able to sought refuge within the earth. Now a hundred years after the magic of the world has become intuned again, the inhabitants of the earth have begun to resurface. What they don't know is that not all of the inhabitants found solice in the Earth.
Those that did not die from the remnants of the dark and light magic that continued to battle against each other long after their casters were dead, were changed. Some good, some bad. Even those hidden in the earth were slowly changed, as one thing affects another.
Prophecy has been kind. It has seen fit not to completely destroy mankind. The heavens have granted the world a second chance. Now a thousand years later as you emerge from the safety of the underground village you once called home, your eyes are awakened to a world you never knew existed.
It is up to you now to fufill prophecy and your destiny and reinvent the world. You are the chosen and how you will live your life on New Earth from here is up to you. Will you seek the the ancient secrets of the dark that once threatened to destroy all of mankind, or will you embrace the light and help to resurrect the idead of peace that once ruled the world.
How the world becomes is now up to you...
The choice is yours."
A base storyline. Easy enough. Some scattered inhabitants here and there etc.. From here on out, the storyline is shaped by us. The storyline is written by the player's actions. New cities and towns emerge slowly over time. As players frequent certain areas, those towns start to grow. The more players visit an area, the quicker a town grows. Have instanced quests that will shape the storyline. Allow players to complete epic battles that never repeat, meaning that if boss badass spawns (a dark wizard resurrected an evil spirit into the flesh) and is killed, the players that resurrected him/her are written in the storyline/history as the ones that did it (they would have to overcome some serious obsticles to do so, or maybe good players ignorantly triggered events of magic gone wrong or found a medallion that activated the event, etc..), The of course those that quelled the mr badass are written into the storyline/history. Maybe mr badass appears again but not for quite a very long time. In the meantime there is never a shortage of players themselves vieing to take over the world or save it.
So really, just start with a vague storyline. If the deves are smart, they'll let the players make the rest up as they go. Saves from having spend 5 years making up an entire world's history that most players will probably never bother with. Also, this would cause players to interact more and rely on each other more as it was meant to be. Players can become enthralled in the storyline because they "are" the storyline.
No auction houses (until later), not insta travle to the enemies doorstep ("most" of that sort of magic is yet to be discovered), And make it a skill/level based class system for which there is no end. No endgame.
Anyway, just my thoughts.
A tiny mind is a tidy mind...
I always thought the major issue with mmorpgs storylines is how well the intergrate you the player into them.
I find nothing more annoying than finding that every class / race is treated identically for example a Paladin being told t go off and slaughter peacful fairies for his class armour or any race visiting its home town and being treated the same as all the other races.
Inorder to grow storytelling in mmorpgs needs to take into account the characeter specifics a elf visiting the elven city should be greeted as a hero returning to the fold whilst a orc visiting should eb treated with suspicion or even out right hostility (falling short of being attacked) Of course EQ1 handled this fairly well by having city factions and allowing players to work their faction.
But, we the players also need to grow up a bit. If you do not read the quest dialog don't complain about lack of story. Its never just go and kill 10 rats there is always a reason and sometimes those reasons are pretty good.
Final note perhaps the biggest failing is the ease of menu selection in the past EQ1 had key words inside the quest dialog these keywords were then used to find more information. It encourged you the player to engage the npc in dialog inorder too find what he knew and get the quest offered. This got you involved in the story and hooked you. You did not know what the reward would be you did not have a silver line or huge question mark/ exclamantion point. You talked to every npc you made notes you hunted for clues.
I remember the early days and the quest for the Soulfire sword in EQ1. It started (at least for me) with a quest to prove myself a knight. This quest started around level 1 finaly conculded in a epic fight with a corrupt captain of the guard. Through out the quest was multiple story lines all linked togather to make a massive quest chain.
Thats what mmorpgs need storylines which hook you in and drag you through quests which you do for the story and the rewards at the end are something which more often than not reminds you of the story even more thasn their own intrensic value as a tool.
Gadareth
First, well-written & interesting article and best still, great points of view all above.
Story in MMO needs to apprehend two things at the beginning.
1. MMO major enjoyment needs to be the fighting mechanic, communication options, level of detail in the world that appears autonomous to the player. If all these are flexible enough then simple playability/ repetitive/repeatable actions can be done successfully/enjoyable with or without a good story.
2. The story has to link with this aspect of the game in a way that (continiously) grows the story.
Some of the problems to achieve this:
1. New Avatars must be limited, specific OR choices that defines the type of story more bespoke to this genesis so it is more personal and cogent to the class/race/creed etc. Too much choice is is no choice ie generic.
2. Storylines do not result in choices closing other potential stories that lead to other types of gameplay. This gives value/judgement to player choices and makes how the story grows affect how the player plays the game (as much as vica-versa!).
3. Player gameplay does not change the world - so the story cannot therefore continue to grow or mean anything other than levelling.
4. Static world with not enough events initiated deus ex to produce a sense of a world that is outside and greater than the influence of the player. 5. Player reputation from choices is the way the player has grown through the story and how any sentient creature should deal/ treat with the player as another consequence.
So story could expand the rewards of players ingame to consist of:
1. Power (this is partly done with level/gear/pvp ability 2. Social Influence that affects those under the banner of said player .3. Factor X let's call the last strand: The rarest of all abilities that the player has the ability to indirectly alter/shape or guide changes to the game-world.
Conclude: A lot of this has not been possible with game worlds to date, a lot requires a better conception of how story can be used in games and much depends on players' demand for this sort of aspect being increasingly developed for MMO's and accepting greater levels of player inequality but also greater diversity of endings to stories for newly created Avatars. Most players will be able to achieve 1. power for their avatar, only a few will achieve 2. power over other avatars and the rarest would effect power to change the very game and the story of everyone else, for good or for bad!!
http://www.gdcvault.com/play/1014633/Classic-Game-Postmortem
This is the reason why I'm always dissapointed by MMOs. I think stories are what drives me to play games. good mechanics are almost as important but if the story is amazing I'll be in it for the long haul even if the gameplay is a little thin. It seems to me that this open ended social genre needs to somehow weave the story into the real time action in a more direct way. possibly through advances in AI technology. Or maybe if the players had better tools to role play there could be more visceral realistic story telling going on in game.
story only has alot to offer single player games, a story in an mmo is that of the player charecter, its really that simple, if you take the players ability to create their own story away from them and give them a linear main game story arc, your essentialy adding an ending to your supposedly endless mmo.
like other posters have already stated, an mmo is a world an ongoing none stop breathing living world full of real people playing charecters, you cannot hit save and shut the system down and wait till you turn it back on again to play, the mmo is always in play, events are allways unfolding, so how can you restrict players to a story line if the world the story is in keeps going while the story the player is following stops while he sleeps, the answer is this, if you do your game is not going to be as good as it can be as an mmo. for instance as some one else has already said, linear quest lines are the same for every single player, that means every single person that plays the game must do the same exact quests as the other players, so when players want to create their own story all they have as reference is the main story arcs they had to sit through when they started to play.
a story always ends. all stories end, can any one who posts on here think of a single story that doesnt have an ending ??? if you can i would like to know about it please!
its bad business to have an mmo with an ending, again like some one else has already said above, when the story ends their is nothing to do so players unsubscribe, this is as true as it can ever be, i always unsubscribe when ive reached the end of the games story content.
reason - nothing else to do other than make another charecter and sit through all the same exact quests again and grind up levels.
i propose questing on a whole be simplified and developer story be completely removed,
the only place i would expect a story driven mmo is in a themed mmo, but even then it would need some reigning in. story should never drive and mmo. sure story defines the peramiters of the game and the feel and sets the pace and depth for emersion. but story doesn t bring about emersion. players bring about emersion by emersing into the content of the game, the story is the theme and back drop from which the players feed of to fuel their own personal stories and identities in the game.
those players that like to grind levels and run dungeons will have very little value for either and will just grind the quests grind the levels get the best geer and pvp himself into a oblivious bordom before moving onto the next mmo title that tickles their fancy.
the vast majority of gamers want content and depth and want to be able to get involved in the games structure. stories dont allow this. a story is like a highway. a road full of cars going from A TO B.
i feel the story should be told at the start of the gamewhen you irst create your charec ter so the players are aware of the world and its main focuss then the story should stop and allow th eplayers to continue the story as they see fit. sure quests guide the players through the games but the quests should not tell the story and lead to an inevitable end. end means closure and closure means time to move to a new game because this one is now boreing and ive completed it.
lol i just completed this mmo, it just sounds so wrong!
So when you add a story to MMO, you take away the story of the player character?
I can assure you you can have both and fairly easily in fact, lol
the idea behind sandbox is to encourage a players imagination to create vibrant ingame content useing their own personality. its like online gameing with player controlled props.
wow is a game that uses npc props, al you do is follow quests guidelines and directions untill you have best items and armour then pvp untill your drawling with boredom before you quit playing.
sandbox offers the players a chance to indulge them selves by utilizeing the freedom of the game worlds mechanics.
what we mean by players being the story is, players creating their own story within the game world, this doesnt mean making their own quests and such.
all mmo's need a guide and theme to drive the player to diffrent areas to unlock diffrent aspects of the game, some mmo's take this literally like lorto and wow, these games are very quest intensive to the point you cannot progress unless you complete the quests in a specific level restricted order, sandbox essentialy removes the must and must nots and the do's and do nots and simply allows the player to progress hwo he wants to progress and dabble in what ever he/she feels like dabbling in.
take eve online for example. to start off its a very good idea to run the game tutorial from start to finish to get a basic understanding, but learning the gaes mechanics is not what the games about, eve has a bac story, but the game its self is created and run by the players. its practically 100% player driven, just because it doesnt have a story defined by the game granted by a mechanic given by an npc doesnt mean the stories are not present. in eve their is a story to be told potentially from every single player that speant more than a month in eve. these are not stories based of his charecter progression but stories based of his experiences in the game world. eve is so free realm that just flying round will inevitably lead to some excitement and exhilerateing experiences. its inevitable that some where along the lines of playign eve that a player will experience something that will grant him/her with an epic tale to tell to other players.
ive been their ive done and ive seen hundreds of other players experience the same thing, and its truely brilliant the way eve works.
i havnt seen this sort of thing in any other mmorpg, because all stories you hear from players are based of the quests and dungeons they have run, and not of simply going about their daily business and routines. i think this is what people refer to when they say player stories!!!
i for one hate being confined to the chlostrophobic confines of a linear story line which will eventually lead me to end game content and canceling my subs because their is nothing else to do.
the best example of this is guild wars, from start to the end you do missions. the last mission = end. once its all over what do you do ???? make a new charecter and run all those exact same quests again and again and read and hear the same old story???? no ofcourse you dont, you indulge in a little pvp then get bored then you change game. most mmo's retain their players for roughly 8 months to a maximum of 2 years on a whole before the player moves along, the majority of players are done with a game after the first year, it shouldnt be possible to clock an mmo and experience all it has to offer ever.
mmo's need to be consistant and ongoing, they need to feel realistic. single player games are for endings mmo's are for experiences.
@ Adamai
I disagree, that a good story can be crafted for players is mutually exclusive of an open-world game system where the design of the game leads and enhances player interactions where story naturally emerges from this interaction. EG Eve by report fits this mold. In fact in my above post you see the "rewards" that a good story can enhance 2. Player interactions.
If the World PvP system in Guild Wars works (using your example) then this also could result in a tigher player interactions for all sides that leads to in-game stories of daring-do, tactics and planning and close-shaves and glory as emergent stories from the players that is not scripted (my preferred gameplay). But this is not exclusive of a player story that has complex webs of causation crafted in with multiple destinations depending on the player's choices, gameplay and player/NPC interactions. It looks like this is exactly what GW2 and Bioware especially with SWOR are both trying to achieve. After a story ends, you say, the game is over, but what lingers in the memory, might be the start of another story?!
http://www.gdcvault.com/play/1014633/Classic-Game-Postmortem
Very nice article, I just started back to coming to this site 2 nights ago, even though I've never posted before. But I like this article. Makes me think and motivates me to work on my story telling more when involving multiple side side stories that tie into the big picture.
-Jae
You are mistaken if you think eve online is a true sandbox. The developers have been caught before with their fingers in the cookie jar rigging things in favor of their friends and having rigged endings to their roleplaying event arcs. It's not a sandbox if the story is railroaded. And I doubt players stuck on the side written to lose no matter what would be pleased that they are wasting their time and ingame assets on being losers, just because the developers said so. That is the exact same linear story line you claim to hate.
Now see... I'm just against needing to have a storyline. When, in any world, has the future been so laid out, so predictable, so boring? I ask because a really great game doesn't need a great story... it needs a playerbase that can handle doing something for nothing.
I admit, it's kinda silly to perform a quest and have a Smiting Sword handed to you AFTER it's complete. Why didn't he hand it to you before the battle, after all, his daughter's life was on the line, right???
I would be quite happy knowing that the reason I am even existing in a virtual world is that there are antagonists that might need culling. If I am chaotic, than the view would change to suit the reason to exist.
One person wrote that Story's end...I beg to differ... I cannot think of one story that could not have an alternate "ending". If that be true, than a story could continue infinitely. Millions of gamers have already proven this by sticking with their favorite game for years. People flocked from game to game because of these three reasons: Graphics, Mechanics, End-Game
The storyline is going to be overlooked for the sake of those three reasons. I don't need a reason to save the Mayor's daughter from the mutated kobold. I just want to challenge the Kobold because it's there. You can tie that battle into whatever story you want. The challenge doesn't lie in how I affect the story because I already know that I do not affect the story. The story is already told, it's been weighed, and completed. No matter how many times you allow me to challenge that Kobold, saving the Mayor's daughter has no meaning... it's all about being able to survive in a situation with hopes that my reward is found in the belly of the beast at hand.
I don't care for NPC rewards. But, if thats the story being told, I guess I gotta take the sword from the guy after the fact that it would have been much more useful before.
As far as the game ending because a story ended... I can honestly say that I believe that is a cop-out or way-out for whomever feels that way. A story is the past, tomorrow is unkown, and today is our chance to turn the story. No RPG can capture the imagination of a human mind...not even the brilliant minds that create the games we play.
I don't see how you can properly tell a story in a persistant world. The problem is, as mentioned above, how many times will dragon X respawn for player Z to kill. The only solution to this seems to be instances but then again this goes against the nature of MMOs and we don't want our MMOs instanced only to have a proper story.
And about the briefer quest texts? Why would you want to have all the important stuff put in 2 lines when you have map markers and stuff. That extra bit of information is just fluff and what some players enjoy to read. It doesn't really matter that it will slow you down. I don't see why would I care about the time I spent to get to max level the first time through. On my alts I skip the wall of text and rush my char to max level
I think story is important in an MMO but I don't think it needs to be a linear story. I also think story can be in a sandbox type MMO, but more in the form of a background, not something that limits the players.
The problem I see with sandboxes is if you leave everything to the players problems arise. I started MMOs in UO and from the beginning I thought that game was fantastic. At first I didn't even mind the PKing, but after about 4 days of dying/respawning/loosing all my loot to PKs I did get frustrated and almost quit the game. Then I met a group of people who were protecting newbies and running off the PKs and I decided to keep playing. I eventually got better at the game and joined thier guild and found myself later doing the same as they did for me. I felt like that was my personal story and it was fun to roleplay the protector of the innocent.
While it worked out for me I know many people who tried UO and left do to rampant PKing that the game had. That is the main problem I see when anyone talks about allowing the players to control their own stories. I don't have a problem with PvP, my problem is with the griefers and my fear is that any purely sandbox MMO is going to be plauged by them.
I think that if they made an MMO that took what UO was, and added further things like building cities, sieging cities, a player economy based soley on crafting, basically all the best ideas from UO and SWG and then found a way to deal with the griefing, then you would be onto something.
Furthermore since when developing this game you are only making the back story, you could take the money saved from hiring writers and instead pay people to do live game events, IE Hobgoblins attacking such and such town.
Anyway those are just some of my ramblings. I may just have to compile all my thought and make a serious post on what is needed for a sandbox MMO.
Vanilla WoW actually had some really great storylines. Most of them were side stories, but a few were epic in scope and immersive in terms of participating in the drama of the main storyline.
I was very sad to see so many stories ended with the expansions, and I'm kind of afraid of the retconning Blizzard will do to make the lore work in the next expansion. Bringing back dead bad guys gets old... =/
The problem I see is that everyone of them follows the old manthra of you adventurer's are good guys here is a quest you need to help with. What if I want to be a bad guy? I am not talking WoW style horde or alliance, I mean what if I want to help out the LK and destroy people who are going to raid his emerging evilness? So the problem is that it will still be linear as in there is a clear deffined good guy and bad guy and we normally fall in to the catagory of good guy.
Jaedor agree with you, Vanilla WoW had excellent stories back then which got dumbed down because people wanted an easier experience. Take for example the Onixia chain of quest that was a great story, but later on no new people wanted to do it, they just wanted to get to end game to raid with there budies. And then you had the individual quest for classes that had great potential but with expansions coming out no one cared about that back story it did not interface at all with the new content.
What I believe they should do is make it relevant at all times but make it an option for those that wish to be part of the story. Take for example the Rogue quest where you had to do something to get into a certain group. Or the lock or pally quest for the epic mount all good stories that where eventually taken out because people thought they where too hard.
So a lot of games start out ok on the story lines and are then irelevent after an expansion comes out and developers dont even try. It is the same with TV shows most of the time, in the US they do a season and if it does ok they do another and another and once it does not they cut the show leaving you with a what just happen they did not finish the story. The UK style is a bit better they pitch a show and they say I want to do 4 seasons worth of show and this is how we are going to end it, so they actually have a conclusion to the current story line. Can they do more seasons after that? Heck yeah they just expand on some of what they had to continue the story in a new direction.
Runstal good point that you bring up but most people do not roleplay so they do not really care, the whole live event would be great. The one thing that was cool that WoW did prior to the WotLK coming out was the one time event of the invasion of the undead where you could get infected. It was something new that they did, there was no temporary events other than the schedule holiday events. If they did more of this it would be great, let out Onyxia out of her cave and wonder the contry side destroying people with a bunch of dragons make it something epic. Have Onixia destroy a town that you have to help rebuild.
Ataka you bring up some very good points. It seems that they do not think they have anything meaninful to give if they do not present some kind of linear way for you to progress. This takes away from the game for some people and it ruins the experience. Some are there because they want to be and if a monster comes around they just want to kill it, if there was some maiden or what ever they saved then fine but if not who cares lol. And very well about being unable to capture the imagination of the human mind. So my earlier input would be a good one, you should be able to say no I am not going to rescue the daughter as a mater of fact I am going to go and see if I can get more money or something from the trolls or whoever stole the daughter.
If they could come up with something similar to Fable I think they would have something really good, I did not play the game but your choices meant something. Most of the time you are limited by the choices. I will say what I did in the last thread about story issues, if you tell X NPC you will help and kill those 10 rats there should be repercussions like you can get another quest from some one else, so your story about what a good guy you are gets told do others and they in turn trust you, or you decide to drop the quest and say screw this I dont want to kill 10 rats, well that should have a repercussion as well and it should be reflected in how you are treated by other NPC's. So same goes for GW2 if you are there during the dynamic event and you decide you will do nothing then you should not be rewarded for being around, hell you should have the option of helping out the attacking trolls or what ever is attacking cause you decided you dont want to be a good guy, and who is to say that the villagers are good guys to begin with? What if they decided to build the town or village or whatever over a troll burial ground or something? Yes I know I am making it more complicated but still.
just a quick two cents:
The standard story in MMO's appears at a glance like a todo list or a grocery list. Do these things; once done, go here. After that task is completed move on to a new area and repeat with slight tweaks to the appearance. The story goes down the list forever and on and on.
What I think would be beneficial to the story system is to give the players a feel like they are writing the story or the content, without the hassel and directionlessness of actually doing that. When I say that, I mean if an army is attacking a town, the mayor says go to the nearby fort and get us some help, you go complete it. Then the army mobilizes to defend the town, the guard doesn't have to tell you "hey lets go kick their ass!" the army actually goes and does it, and you want to go with them to get in on the action. The player feels like they decided to go do that and got rewarded for it, and if they say I'm gonna ditch this series, it's ok, and they did their part then left.
the story will move with the player and be open to pick and choose, it is more appealing
Story is overrated because we have always had story in mmos and in other types of games. The first 2 games that come to midn right away when you talk about story is Diablo rpgs and Guild Wars. Those games had story and cinematics that told you the story and happening of the world around you. Developers need to focus on better gameplay mechanics rather than mess with story so much. I like story but I don't see what the big deal is when we have always had it ?
I disagree with UsualSuspect's assertion that stories must have an ending. As they say the ending is just the beginning. In books all we see is one segment of the characters' overall story. Where the book ends often times more tales will take place(or would if the world continued to 'live' after the author was 'done' writing the book/series).
However, it is true that with how 'epic' many games or even books get there eventually comes a point where you just can't up the ante anymore. I mean where do you go after you have defeated the Lord of despair the source of all evil[or some such]? Saving a farm from bandits doesn't really seem like the next progression or exciting considering at that point you are practically a god yourself.
That said you can probably guess that I would rather see a story where the players are more or less wandering mercenaries. Yeah sometimes you may be involved in the rise and fall of kingdoms, but much of your adventures would be more mundane. This story could go on indefinitely.
As for a quest only doable once as Serajin stated "If I resuced the Mayors daughter, thats it. No other player should have that "quest" available to them - ever (even new players to the server). The world moves on."
I must disagree. First of all I must admit I play to play the whole game. I don't like it when I can't access some content for whatever reason. But thinking about The 4th Coming is an MMORPG that had one quest that was done interestingly. You mention a Mayor's Daughter being kidnapped, well in T4C there was a bishop who needed healed because he was poisoned. If you were a well doer you had to heal him. But what to do if someone already healed him? Well you see the not so well doers would poison him. As for why he kept getting poisoned? Well I guess he just really loved his Apples
. What type of Bishop can't resist temptation?! Tsk Tsk.
So in that vein someone who fights for justice may receive notice that the mayor of X village is in dire need because his daughter has been kidnapped by this bandit who wishes to force her to become his bride. The ally of justice rushes in and frees her, returning her to her father. However, The bandit may not be content with just giving up and he starts searching for someone to kidnapp her and bring him to her. Clearly this would be a job a not so well doer could take up.
Like in T4C quests and the choices you make during them could add 'points' to an alignment score. If a certain score is achieved you can access certain quests. Unlike T4C my personal preference would be a less set path(T4C had a rather clear good/evil divide) and a very wide variety of quests that access many different options. For example perhaps when kidnapping the mayor's daughter you learn that she wishes to explore the world and would reward you if you let her go at the next town. Thus, the next well doer would learn that the Daughter was kidnapped, but when you bust up the bandits camp you find out that the mercenary had ran off with her(and thus you have to track her down to the town she was left at and drag her back to her father). Or something like that. Like in some T4C quests a timer could be added. This way if you take too long the mayor/bandit would hire a more competent mercenary. Etc.
As I ramble just let me say that I find a powerful story to be a must, I can actually overlook poor game mechanics if the story is good enough(though the game must still be 'playable'). However, the converse is also true, excellent game mechanics can bring me in even if the story is very very bad. But to qualify as an excellent game it must reach a certain level in both fields in my opinion.
I agree and disagree on whether sotyline is more or less important than mechanics. I think that if both are implimented correctly, the two should go hand in hand creating deeper immersion and a more enjoyable experience. If old man farmer says he will pay me 1 gold per rat I kill on his land because they are destroying his crops, for which the local palace rely on for some of thier food... great. But if I agree and then find out that regardless of whether I kill the rats or not, the palace never actually runs out of said item (because the devs never atually made this part of the game mechanic), then really the long drawn out storyline just for some low level rats is negate and has no real value to the player exept as a grindfest for gold. Completing the quest will not impact any part of the game whatsoever and the player is not in fact helping anyone or harming if they refuse. If the outcome doesn't actually inpact the game world (or at least that area/region), then really why bother with a long drawn out explination. Save the resouces for something in the game that does count. and just have old man farmer say. "I'll pay you 1 gold for every rat you kill because I hate rats"...the end.
A tiny mind is a tidy mind...
Voice over.. I'd rather hear it than read it anyday. When STO has Spock talking when you are exploring a new area.. I mute my voice-chat and listen. His voice is so compelling... the voice adds a layer of immersion that makes the player open to listening... or wanting to listen.
MMOs suffer the 'repeating quest' syndrome.. where the story gets repeated a dozen or more times (with small variants) so that you actually start training yourself to phase-out the story so that you can just 'get the goods' you came here to get.... having to do the quest 6 to 10 times because the MMO reward system is based on 'quest tokens'. Take SWG Heroic instances... 8x each for most x 5 x 4 = 160 iterations of the same 5 stories over and over again.
The 'repeatable quest' concept absolutely demolishes the storytelling expertience.. players cannot phase out and into content so easily once they are 'trained' to skip the dialogue.
Its worse when its multi-player and 1 or more of those players have already 'done' the quest on a previous character. They want to push forward and will often leave you standing alone if you don't "just skip it.. press OK already".
BIOWARE with TOR stories and voice immersion looks like they are going to make a serious run a getting players & their characters more involved in the story than just item questing. Full voiceover.. multiple stories based not only on character type but also previous actions.. and companion NPC 'behavior' influence as well.
US players.. you and me.. who have trained ourselves to ignore the story will need to 'unlearn what we have learned' in order to truely enjoy the increadible stories that the developers poor hundreds of hours into making.. while we breeze past it in a 4 hour 'power session'.
In MMO's its good to SLOW DOWN and smell the roses... in fact, the times I've enjoyed MMO play the most is when I've not been under any sort of pressure to 'catch up' or join the 'min/max' group for end-content PvP.
For TOR... I am going to take my time.. and really listen to the story... because thats a big reason why I play the game in the first place.
SWG/STO/(SWTOR)
You may have a point about having a good story. I do not recant waht I've said earlier, but having come from viewing a movie, The Sorcerer's Apprentice I found myself immersed because of the story and over-looked the cheesey side-show for it.
It wasn't the main story that got my attention, it was the backstory. In MMOGs, the back story is huge, it's stuffed down your mouth and tastes rather bland at times. I spent three days in the Scarlet Monestary of WoW just to read all the books laying around. Those books were hidden gems that told a story I could appreciate.
The main story in most MMOs is similar to saying steak is steak no matter where it's served. So untrue. All these characters with some delimma is driving me insane. I mean, how many sons or daughters must avenge the death of their parent? How many times must we here that Elves sold magic for shining trinkets? How many generations have we waited for you to come along, the chosen one?
In the movie, TSA, myths and legends came together for a incredible cause. My part was to assist the protagonist to his destiny, in spite of his lack of experience, unwillingness and casual approach to what should have been the greatest honor achievable by any mage/sage.
In one game, the hardcore players were left in awe as a casual player named Tim The Enchanter had his name etched into stone within the game. A forever marking that allowed me to endeavor regardless of the other stories around me.
I want the story to take me from a vagabond to a hero, as well as making my accomplishment a living part of the story. Then, I wouldn't be here writing, now would I?