They are few very specific rpg games, some solo some mmo, that actually have different approch on killing. In some games building things is actually more important than destroying stuff, or kill stuff, but ye they are pretty rare, exceptions in fact. Those games are usually made by pationate designers, nothing even close to the lambda designer that might have a huge team and a montain of gold but who deliver such shallow and tasteless games. In fact few years ago i was pretty confident nothing really new could ever come come an already set game company, but some companies still manage to keep their unique feeling, so i think a bit otherwise now.
Anyway, there is a kind of "underground" gaming out there that offer something else, its not very easy to approach but actually if you are curious enough and are ready to accept strange ideas, it is worth it. But just like 99% of the designers are without imagination 99% of the gamers are just too close minded to even try those games, and even less to dedicate a bunch of hours trying to understand and learn them.
I think there is a thread somewhere in mmorpg forums that try to list all those strange games.
I didn't discount the social aspect. The social aspect is inside of the desirable outcome. And the UNdesirable outcome is if the other players don't socialize with you.
The point is that with the swg entertainer, it was a weak game because it had a weak foundation in the five characteristics.
A strong game isn't going to make you have to pretend that a goal is there. What you're saying about making my own goals for a game is like saying if a game fails with bad game design, then I should pretend that the good game design is actually there. If I want to do that, I will, but if I don't, then I just won't play that game. That's what the majority of people will do when they are offered a game with bad game design.
I have to disagree. A sandbox game forces the player to create their own goals in the game. A themepark game forces the player to play goals defined by the dev team. What was original SWG? Sandbox.
You even say yourself that a musician in real life has a huge opposing force factor to deal with like making money. If a real life musician plays bad, then they have a very real problem in that they won't be able to pay for things. Making money, learning new songs/dances, and socializing is about the only things an entertainer in swg can do that is related to what you can also do in real life. What ISN'T the same is that there's no consequence for not getting any tips in swg. So if you are going to make a living breathing game world out of swg, then you will have to give an entertainer a good strong opposing force to interact with, like if you don't get enough tips every day your character will lose something important. This way you will actually have to play hard at being an entertainer so you can work for something. You also have to make playing instruments or dancing more fun than just pushing 1 button every 5-10 seconds to make your character keep playing/dancing. Playing an instrument and dancing should take a lot of practice of experience and knowledge. Just like it does in real life.
Disagree. One can waste time and effort. I don't know about you, but trying to do something and not gatting anything out of it for hours is very frustating. There's no need to have a loss, if you can't get the reward, since not getting the reward is a loss. Which is much more strongly felt if it's the player's own goal. To obtain is as much of a goal as a pvper's goal is to kill.
Of course sword fighting in real life takes far more experience and knowledge to do than playing a warrior in wow, but if it took the same amount then players wouldn't think it's a very fun video game. There's a range of difficulty. I would say pushing a button every 5-10 seconds to make your character play a new tune or dance in swg is about brain dead difficulty, where in wow a warrior that has to know how to switch stances from battle stance to berserker stance to defensive stance, know 20 buttons for each stance, when to use them, know how they work and what they do, use interrupts effectively by switching to one-hand with shield and back to two-hand, and be circle strafing your enemies all while you have focus target macros for a couple or more would be more like hard difficulty. No, it's not insane or nightmare difficulty like being a real life swordsman would be, it's just plain old fashioned "kinda hard." It doesn't take a leet gamer to play a wow warrior or any class in wow really, it just takes a level of practice that is considered slightly challenging.
If I wanted to play an innkeeper in wow, I would want the game to be almost as challenging as playing a real innkeeper in real life.
So.. you want social games to be harder than combat games? How's that even fair?
There's a quest in wow for players who learn first aid. You have to speedily click to provide first aid to wounded people as they come in or they will die. This is a neutral opposing force (like getting tips in swg) that people will actually die if you do not attend to them fast enough, but no real lose factor other than you might have to do it again (because you don't care about inanimate NPCs dying in a video game that will have no effect on your character in the game). Imagine if you fail you have to level up through several levels of first aid again. This would make you not want to mess up and take it a little more seriously. The reward is that you gain more powerful bandaid skills. Now just imagine a game like this for an innkeeper but with more depth and more things you have to do that's a lot more interactive with more win and lose situations other than standing in an inn's doorway offering hearth binds to other players for innkeeper points. Then it would be good game design.
If you want a "social game" only then don't play games with any interaction with an opposing force basically. Opposing forces tend to make you have to play the game instead of chat. There's virtual chat room or non-competitive games for that.
I've got to disagree on this aswell. Look at Eve for example. You technically don't have to kill anything or anyone in it. Especially if you can lead, and talk charismatically, you can go a lot farther than if you just play as a pirate or a corporate mook. Corporate alliances, spying, theft, politics etc all require their own kind of skills, and aren't goals that are defined by anyone but the players.
If you want a real breathing world simulation, then it will always need to have some opposing force factor in it (just like real life has). If you're going to have a really really real mmo world like Dawn, then have giving birth to actual characters, aging, permanent character death, and the like, all of which turn out to be opposing factors because the player playing your kid might try to grief their parents for fun.
Again, still disagree. There doesn't need to be an outside opposition for there to be a game. Solitaire is a game of chance, a Rubix cube is a puzzle game where the player's own mind is the limiting factor. I think you're definition of the word game differs from the actual definition.
@OP An opposing force doesn't mean fighting/killing. An opposing force is anything the player interacts with in order to achieve a desirable outcome. A timer countdown while you attempt to finish a puzzle for instance is an opposing force. Has nothing to do with stabbing another player.
I have to disagree. A sandbox game forces the player to create their own goals in the game. A themepark game forces the player to play goals defined by the dev team. What was original SWG? Sandbox.
A sandbox still has goals. Short term goals like not dieing and exploring the immediate area. Long term goals like skilling up your character and discovering the layout of the entire game world. And an ultimate goal which is to give players the ultimate goal to achieve such as be the best rogue/thief, or to have the best castle or city, best warrior, etc.
Disagree. One can waste time and effort. I don't know about you, but trying to do something and not gatting anything out of it for hours is very frustating. There's no need to have a loss, if you can't get the reward, since not getting the reward is a loss. Which is much more strongly felt if it's the player's own goal. To obtain is as much of a goal as a pvper's goal is to kill.
I agree that too much loss frustrates players. I have been there in Dark Age of Camelot. Spent an entire day leveling and died a couple of times and lost it all. Some loss is still very important otherwise there is no loser and therefore it is not really a full game you are playing but a facet of a game. It's merely a sequential slideshow for an observer which makes you feel like you are playing a game because the outcome is always that you win something.
So.. you want social games to be harder than combat games? How's that even fair?
I didn't say social games, I said an innkeeper class in wow. I also said I want it to be just as hard.
I've got to disagree on this aswell. Look at Eve for example. You technically don't have to kill anything or anyone in it. Especially if you can lead, and talk charismatically, you can go a lot farther than if you just play as a pirate or a corporate mook. Corporate alliances, spying, theft, politics etc all require their own kind of skills, and aren't goals that are defined by anyone but the players.
Yes but in eve the "social" things you can do all have an opposing force like the threat of getting found out if you are a spy and getting hunted down and killed for doing so or hated. If you are a miner you have the threat of getting blown up by bandits and you only make money if you manage to sell your ores. Good game design.
Again, still disagree. There doesn't need to be an outside opposition for there to be a game. Solitaire is a game of chance, a Rubix cube is a puzzle game where the player's own mind is the limiting factor. I think you're definition of the word game differs from the actual definition.
Solitaire, if you play by the rules, has an opposing force that if you do not wisely make the right card choices, then you will run out of re-tries in the deck or get stuck without the right cards (and of course, by chance you can lose as well).
Your reference to puzzles/rubix cubes being games is a good one because you can spend as much time as you want to "win." It's also VERY challenging to beat a puzzle because of the time factor, but when was the last time puzzles made a video game I ask you? They don't sell well because puzzles alone without timer countdowns and other opposing forces don't make really interesting video games. Think about how successful Tetris is. Even games like Sierra Adventure games had opposing forces like items if you missed you completely lost the game or countdowns but were huge adventure puzzle games. Games like zelda were puzzle games implemented with opposing forces to prevent you from spending TOO much time figuring it out and these kinds of games always had immediate, short/long term, and ultimate goals with the ability to lose or get a high score or beat the dark lord and his minions.
I think the only reason we disagree is because I think your definition of a game is really the definition of a contest, Plasmicredx. You don't need an opposing force in a game all you need is: rules, challenge, interaction, and a goal. But you do need an opposing force in a contest.
Besides, an entertainer does have an opposing force, you just refuse to accept the opposing force as other players.
add: I suppose I should clearify. One doesn't need a contest in a game, and one doesn't need a game in a contest. Though they can overlap, and do often.
I think the only reason we disagree is because I think your definition of a game is really the definition of a contest, Plasmicredx. You don't need an opposing force in a game all you need is: rules, challenge, interaction, and a goal. But you do need an opposing force in a contest.
Besides, an entertainer does have an opposing force, you just refuse to accept the opposing force as other players.
If a game is not a contest (no winner or loser), then all it is, is a linear sequential slideshow that leads to some outcome but you can't really say you won anything because you couldn't lose anything. It's more of an art program (like a lego game where the goal is to just build anything at all it doesn't matter) or a story book or movie.
I did already say an entertainer has an opposing force but it's a weak one. It's like a puzzle you just go play music and hope to get tips. There is no real winner or loser. If you didn't get tips that day it doesn't set you back in any way. You just keep going and playing music.
/tear, I miss SWG because of all those cool elements...
I think SWG did it best with the professions. Hanging out in coronet cantina was a blast when there were tons of people socializing. Or waiting in a buff life while chatting to the dude in front of you.
Or being friends with one of the best crafters on the server, and always having people bug me to introduce them to him so they could get good gear and possible benefits lol.
I believe Stargate World (R.I.P.) had non-combat mini-games for the tech and archaeolgy professions. As others have said, they need more non-combat profesions, like pre-NGE SWG, for this to succeed but unfortunately gaing companies only do combat. Maybe a good SciFi MMO would enable other non-combat professions to be utilized.
I think the only reason we disagree is because I think your definition of a game is really the definition of a contest, Plasmicredx. You don't need an opposing force in a game all you need is: rules, challenge, interaction, and a goal. But you do need an opposing force in a contest.
Besides, an entertainer does have an opposing force, you just refuse to accept the opposing force as other players.
If a game is not a contest (no winner or loser), then all it is, is a linear sequential slideshow that leads to some outcome but you can't really say you won anything because you couldn't lose anything. It's more of an art program (like a lego game where the goal is to just build anything at all it doesn't matter) or a story book or movie.
I did already say an entertainer has an opposing force but it's a weak one. It's like a puzzle you just go play music and hope to get tips. There is no real winner or loser. If you didn't get tips that day it doesn't set you back in any way. You just keep going and playing music.
Why do you need to "win" anything? Why can't the enjoyment of whatever your doing be enough? If there has to be some type of "win" mechanic what about skill-ups- in the dancer example the more you use those skills the better you get at them?
I think the only reason we disagree is because I think your definition of a game is really the definition of a contest, Plasmicredx. You don't need an opposing force in a game all you need is: rules, challenge, interaction, and a goal. But you do need an opposing force in a contest.
Besides, an entertainer does have an opposing force, you just refuse to accept the opposing force as other players.
If a game is not a contest (no winner or loser), then all it is, is a linear sequential slideshow that leads to some outcome but you can't really say you won anything because you couldn't lose anything. It's more of an art program (like a lego game where the goal is to just build anything at all it doesn't matter) or a story book or movie.
I did already say an entertainer has an opposing force but it's a weak one. It's like a puzzle you just go play music and hope to get tips. There is no real winner or loser. If you didn't get tips that day it doesn't set you back in any way. You just keep going and playing music.
Why do you need to "win" anything? Why can't the enjoyment of whatever your doing be enough? If there has to be some type of "win" mechanic what about skill-ups- in the dancer example the more you use those skills the better you get at them?
It's not about winning. It's about there being a loser. I need to lose too. I'm a good loser and I get enjoyment out of losing because it makes me learn what I did wrong. Opposing forces cause the game to lead to an UNdesirable outcome, such as time running out on a puzzle and therefore I lose.
Again opposing force doesn't have to be killing other players. Which is why this information is beneficial to this thread. Using this info people can make games with strong game design that is not about killing people.
I think the only reason we disagree is because I think your definition of a game is really the definition of a contest, Plasmicredx. You don't need an opposing force in a game all you need is: rules, challenge, interaction, and a goal. But you do need an opposing force in a contest.
Besides, an entertainer does have an opposing force, you just refuse to accept the opposing force as other players.
If a game is not a contest (no winner or loser), then all it is, is a linear sequential slideshow that leads to some outcome but you can't really say you won anything because you couldn't lose anything. It's more of an art program (like a lego game where the goal is to just build anything at all it doesn't matter) or a story book or movie.
I did already say an entertainer has an opposing force but it's a weak one. It's like a puzzle you just go play music and hope to get tips. There is no real winner or loser. If you didn't get tips that day it doesn't set you back in any way. You just keep going and playing music.
By your definition Simon Says would be a puzzle and not a game. but for the opposite reason, there's no way to win, ever.
Weak to you. It's a definate conflict. If the entertainer sucks or is an ass, people won't give him money even if he had the best buffs. If the entertainer is good and very charismatic, that player could earn more from customers, just from impressing them. The goal is money. The challenge is social, mechanics, and visual skills. The conflict is or can be getting money, social standing, popularity, or even fans from the player populace as a whole. And this is not counting the competition between entertainers.
physically attacking is a rather local conflict as it can only injure 1 or a few people. Manipulation through words can afftect millions of people and the conflict becomes a broad. Game wise the entertainer's skill at atracting other players to pay them is a for of social manipulation. the losers would be those entertainers than can't attract people, or do worse than the entertainer across the street. The winners are the opposite. Being the local deva that other entertainers can't even compete against, or becoming highly renown amongst others is a definate reward.
Still that's a sandbox goal, as the devs don't define the goal, the player does.
On the grand scale though there are no winners in any MMO, as no one can beat the game. They can only do better than the rest, or achieve their goals. So, would an MMO itself be considered a game if you can't win?
While this debate could be considered a game so long as one of us concedes or gives up.
I think the only reason we disagree is because I think your definition of a game is really the definition of a contest, Plasmicredx. You don't need an opposing force in a game all you need is: rules, challenge, interaction, and a goal. But you do need an opposing force in a contest.
Besides, an entertainer does have an opposing force, you just refuse to accept the opposing force as other players.
If a game is not a contest (no winner or loser), then all it is, is a linear sequential slideshow that leads to some outcome but you can't really say you won anything because you couldn't lose anything. It's more of an art program (like a lego game where the goal is to just build anything at all it doesn't matter) or a story book or movie.
I did already say an entertainer has an opposing force but it's a weak one. It's like a puzzle you just go play music and hope to get tips. There is no real winner or loser. If you didn't get tips that day it doesn't set you back in any way. You just keep going and playing music.
By your definition Simon Says would be a puzzle and not a game. but for the opposite reason, there's no way to win, ever.
Weak to you. It's a definate conflict. If the entertainer sucks or is an ass, people won't give him money even if he had the best buffs. If the entertainer is good and very charismatic, that player could earn more from customers, just from impressing them. The goal is money. The challenge is social, mechanics, and visual skills. The conflict is or can be getting money, social standing, popularity, or even fans from the player populace as a whole. And this is not counting the competition between entertainers.
physically attacking is a rather local conflict as it can only injure 1 or a few people. Manipulation through words can afftect millions of people and the conflict becomes a broad. Game wise the entertainer's skill at atracting other players to pay them is a for of social manipulation. the losers would be those entertainers than can't attract people, or do worse than the entertainer across the street. The winners are the opposite. Being the local deva that other entertainers can't even compete against, or becoming highly renown amongst others is a definate reward.
Still that's a sandbox goal, as the devs don't define the goal, the player does.
On the grand scale though there are no winners in any MMO, as no one can beat the game. They can only do better than the rest, or achieve their goals. So, would an MMO itself be considered a game if you can't win?
While this debate could be considered a game so long as one of us concedes or gives up.
In Simon Says, the winner is the remaining player. The losers are the rest who didn't follow. The rules are that you keep playing, getting faster and faster and tricking people. The problem with simon says is that sometimes no one ever loses so the game eventually has to stop. If you never encountered that in simon says like I did, then you must have not played it enough times. That was a flaw in its game design, but it was a good strong game design because it does have winners and losers.
Again, entertainer in swg is not weak because I think it's weak. It's weak because it puts the game on a sequential track where you may ONLY advance forward to a progressive outcome like a puzzle with no setting the player back at all unlike simon says where if you lose, then you don't get to be simon says for next round. You can't be a musician entertainer in swg and lose. You are also leaving out the fact that even if you are incredibly good at being an entertainer, even if you are the best, that players can still decide not to tip you. So in order to play an entertainer in swg, you must be willing to accept that the game has no design in place for this. "Bad" entertainers can still make money or even make more money than the best entertainers because it's based on player choice.
Winning a game comes from getting any sorts of desirable outcomes (as long as there is an undesirable outcome for each winnable outcome). You might win at short term goals and this is still considered winning a small amount as long as you could have lost. There are multiple desirable outcomes in sandbox and mmorpg games. The ultimate desirable outcome in wow is to defeat the dark lord and his minions. You can lose this ultimate goal by getting killed by the dark lord. The dark lord usually changes every expansion pack. Though some people don't even bother with the ultimate goal.
Some are satisfied with shorter goals. But the ultimate goal is there which is why it's good game design. In sandboxes you still can have an ultimate goal to defeat a dark lord. What makes a sandbox is nonlinear gameplay which allows the players to do anything they want. Being able to write your own world is impossible without uploadable community content, and even this is still playing some player's story he wrote for you.
If there is no conflict at all and no monsters to defeat or players to defeat then there's just an empty world with no history. If you allow players to play as monsters and form civilizations, then and only then can players start to write their own sandbox while playing the game, but even then, the game is being written within some sort of context: medieval fantasy, sci-fi, western, a mix of all, and others. Sandboxes I've seen always had pvp and pve unless it was an art program (not a real game) like second life. So even though you are free to do whatever you want in most real sandbox games, there is always some discoverable desirable or undesirable outcome. Some of the goals are to be the best at pvp or pve, acquire the most stuff, build destructible castles from lots of resource gathering, etc. What if someone blows up your castle in your sandbox?
Other desirable outcomes in themeparks are generally winning pvp matches, gaining a lot of gold, not dieing when you attempt to get better gear, explore the world, etc. All of which are ways to win the game and even have undesirable outcomes like if you head to a pve dungeon and there's some enemy players camping the door. Losing gold from bad purchases. Acquiring gear has undesirable outcomes that is tied to your character like if your character dies on the boss and have to wait to fight him next time.
A virtual world where you are only able to interact with other players and things doesn't make something a full game. It only makes it a facet of a game. Design a game where you throw a ball back and forth to one another for example. You throw the ball, the ball goes to them, then they may throw the ball back at their leisure. This is a very weak game design. Now design an opposing force into the game such as that the other player may drop or not catch the ball. Whoever drops it, the other player gets +1 to their score. Now you have a stronger game design than before. Stronger game design does not mean that the weaker game design cannot be enjoyed. It means that it is better design overall because it completes it as a full game. This also has important effects on the players such as making them want to try harder at not dropping the ball, and giving the game an extra final score such as playing best 2 out of 3 or play until first to a score of 5 can give the game "closure" rather than just passing a ball back and forth with no other outcome or ending like you can find in a movie.
I think the real question here is "Is interaction without multiple outcomes good enough make a full game?" Well news media having trouble describing second life as a game probably doesn't make it so, but clearly games like it are closer to a 3D chat room than an actual game.
And no, before someone further questions that I disagree with the OP and the main subject of the thread, no. I don't. Just having a talk about why swg entertainer had weak game design and how it can be strengthened.
In Simon Says, the winner is the remaining player. The losers are the rest who didn't follow. The rules are that you keep playing, getting faster and faster and tricking people. The problem with simon says is that sometimes no one ever loses so the game eventually has to stop. If you never encountered that in simon says like I did, then you must have not played it enough times. That was a flaw in its game design, but it was a good strong game design because it does have winners and losers.
It only has winners and losers if someone fails to do as simon says. Other wise it'll could technically continue to infinity. Though usually someone's gotta eat or use the bathroom lol
Again, entertainer in swg is not weak because I think it's weak. It's weak because it puts the game on a sequential track where you may ONLY advance forward to a progressive outcome like a puzzle with no setting the player back at all unlike simon says where if you lose, then you don't get to be simon says for next round. You can't be a musician entertainer in swg and lose. You are also leaving out the fact that even if you are incredibly good at being an entertainer, even if you are the best, that players can still decide not to tip you. So in order to play an entertainer in swg, you must be willing to accept that the game has no design in place for this. "Bad" entertainers can still make money or even make more money than the best entertainers because it's based on player choice.
I think that's sandbox design allowing players to govern themselves. Hell in EQ if I didn't 'tip' a person porting me, I'd never get a port from him, his friends, or his guild again. Though its was back before the Plane of Knowledge. do it enough times, and you'd alienate yourself for ports period except from newbs and friends. Same deal with crack buffs(clarity varients). Players creating rules, and enforcing them through various means.
At the core of the entertainer, I think it is more sandboxy than say the bounty hunter. As you kind had to evolve player rules with the class as a community to support it. If you didn't very few would play it as no one would get any tips and what not from them. They'd just be buff bot alts.
Winning a game comes from getting any sorts of desirable outcomes (as long as there is an undesirable outcome for each winnable outcome). You might win at short term goals and this is still considered winning a small amount as long as you could have lost. There are multiple desirable outcomes in sandbox and mmorpg games. The ultimate desirable outcome in wow is to defeat the dark lord and his minions. You can lose this ultimate goal by getting killed by the dark lord. The dark lord usually changes every expansion pack. Though some people don't even bother with the ultimate goal.
Some are satisfied with shorter goals. But the ultimate goal is there which is why it's good game design. In sandboxes you still can have an ultimate goal to defeat a dark lord. What makes a sandbox is nonlinear gameplay which allows the players to do anything they want. Being able to write your own world is impossible without uploadable community content, and even this is still playing some player's story he wrote for you.
You obviously haven't played EVE or read about how they do expansions, if you think PvE conflict HAS to be the ultimate goal.
If there is no conflict at all and no monsters to defeat or players to defeat then there's just an empty world with no history. If you allow players to play as monsters and form civilizations, then and only then can players start to write their own sandbox while playing the game, but even then, the game is being written within some sort of context: medieval fantasy, sci-fi, western, a mix of all, and others. Sandboxes I've seen always had pvp and pve unless it was an art program (not a real game) like second life. So even though you are free to do whatever you want in most real sandbox games, there is always some discoverable desirable or undesirable outcome. Some of the goals are to be the best at pvp or pve, acquire the most stuff, build destructible castles from lots of resource gathering, etc. What if someone blows up your castle in your sandbox?
Typically it's revenge or rage quit. sometimes crying lol
Other desirable outcomes in themeparks are generally winning pvp matches, gaining a lot of gold, not dieing when you attempt to get better gear, explore the world, etc. All of which are ways to win the game and even have undesirable outcomes like if you head to a pve dungeon and there's some enemy players camping the door. Losing gold from bad purchases. Acquiring gear has undesirable outcomes that is tied to your character like if your character dies on the boss and have to wait to fight him next time.
A virtual world where you are only able to interact with other players and things doesn't make something a full game. It only makes it a facet of a game. Design a game where you throw a ball back and forth to one another for example. You throw the ball, the ball goes to them, then they may throw the ball back at their leisure. This is a very weak game design. Now design an opposing force into the game such as that the other player may drop or not catch the ball. Whoever drops it, the other player gets +1 to their score. Now you have a stronger game design than before. Stronger game design does not mean that the weaker game design cannot be enjoyed. It means that it is better design overall because it completes it as a full game. This also has important effects on the players such as making them want to try harder at not dropping the ball, and giving the game an extra final score such as playing best 2 out of 3 or play until first to a score of 5 can give the game "closure" rather than just passing a ball back and forth with no other outcome or ending like you can find in a movie.
I think the real question here is "Is interaction without multiple outcomes good enough make a full game?" Well news media having trouble describing second life as a game probably doesn't make it so, but clearly games like it are closer to a 3D chat room than an actual game.
Really that question could be asked of MMOs in general as there's no,"I beat the game" only micro victories. beat a dungeon? micro victory. Get that item you wanted on the auction house? Micro victory. Win that duel? micro victory. Does it affect the game world? no. Does it affect hundreds or thousands of people? no. That's all theme park gaming.
True Sand box gaming is rather ambiguous. As the developers don't set the players goal. they give the players the ability to make their own content. The better the sandbox the more you can make. Eve is a great example. Second life takes it even farther with no PvE content except for what players make. Second life is like buying legos. At first it's not a game, but if you make a car, now you can use that car and race someone with it. Having the developers dictate to the player what the goals and conflicts are, is themepark.
And no, before someone further questions that I disagree with the OP and the main subject of the thread, no. I don't. Just having a talk about why swg entertainer had weak game design.
I think the only reason we disagree is because I think your definition of a game is really the definition of a contest, Plasmicredx. You don't need an opposing force in a game all you need is: rules, challenge, interaction, and a goal. But you do need an opposing force in a contest.
Besides, an entertainer does have an opposing force, you just refuse to accept the opposing force as other players.
If a game is not a contest (no winner or loser), then all it is, is a linear sequential slideshow that leads to some outcome but you can't really say you won anything because you couldn't lose anything. It's more of an art program (like a lego game where the goal is to just build anything at all it doesn't matter) or a story book or movie.
I did already say an entertainer has an opposing force but it's a weak one. It's like a puzzle you just go play music and hope to get tips. There is no real winner or loser. If you didn't get tips that day it doesn't set you back in any way. You just keep going and playing music.
By your definition Simon Says would be a puzzle and not a game. but for the opposite reason, there's no way to win, ever.
Weak to you. It's a definate conflict. If the entertainer sucks or is an ass, people won't give him money even if he had the best buffs. If the entertainer is good and very charismatic, that player could earn more from customers, just from impressing them. The goal is money. The challenge is social, mechanics, and visual skills. The conflict is or can be getting money, social standing, popularity, or even fans from the player populace as a whole. And this is not counting the competition between entertainers.
physically attacking is a rather local conflict as it can only injure 1 or a few people. Manipulation through words can afftect millions of people and the conflict becomes a broad. Game wise the entertainer's skill at atracting other players to pay them is a for of social manipulation. the losers would be those entertainers than can't attract people, or do worse than the entertainer across the street. The winners are the opposite. Being the local deva that other entertainers can't even compete against, or becoming highly renown amongst others is a definate reward.
Still that's a sandbox goal, as the devs don't define the goal, the player does.
On the grand scale though there are no winners in any MMO, as no one can beat the game. They can only do better than the rest, or achieve their goals. So, would an MMO itself be considered a game if you can't win?
While this debate could be considered a game so long as one of us concedes or gives up.
In Simon Says, the winner is the remaining player. The losers are the rest who didn't follow. The rules are that you keep playing, getting faster and faster and tricking people. The problem with simon says is that sometimes no one ever loses so the game eventually has to stop. If you never encountered that in simon says like I did, then you must have not played it enough times. That was a flaw in its game design, but it was a good strong game design because it does have winners and losers.
Again, entertainer in swg is not weak because I think it's weak. It's weak because it puts the game on a sequential track where you may ONLY advance forward to a progressive outcome like a puzzle with no setting the player back at all unlike simon says where if you lose, then you don't get to be simon says for next round. You can't be a musician entertainer in swg and lose. You are also leaving out the fact that even if you are incredibly good at being an entertainer, even if you are the best, that players can still decide not to tip you. So in order to play an entertainer in swg, you must be willing to accept that the game has no design in place for this. "Bad" entertainers can still make money or even make more money than the best entertainers because it's based on player choice.
Winning a game comes from getting any sorts of desirable outcomes (as long as there is an undesirable outcome for each winnable outcome). You might win at short term goals and this is still considered winning a small amount as long as you could have lost. There are multiple desirable outcomes in sandbox and mmorpg games. The ultimate desirable outcome in wow is to defeat the dark lord and his minions. You can lose this ultimate goal by getting killed by the dark lord. The dark lord usually changes every expansion pack. Though some people don't even bother with the ultimate goal.
Some are satisfied with shorter goals. But the ultimate goal is there which is why it's good game design. In sandboxes you still can have an ultimate goal to defeat a dark lord. What makes a sandbox is nonlinear gameplay which allows the players to do anything they want. Being able to write your own world is impossible without uploadable community content, and even this is still playing some player's story he wrote for you.
If there is no conflict at all and no monsters to defeat or players to defeat then there's just an empty world with no history. If you allow players to play as monsters and form civilizations, then and only then can players start to write their own sandbox while playing the game, but even then, the game is being written within some sort of context: medieval fantasy, sci-fi, western, a mix of all, and others. Sandboxes I've seen always had pvp and pve unless it was an art program (not a real game) like second life. So even though you are free to do whatever you want in most real sandbox games, there is always some discoverable desirable or undesirable outcome. Some of the goals are to be the best at pvp or pve, acquire the most stuff, build destructible castles from lots of resource gathering, etc. What if someone blows up your castle in your sandbox?
Other desirable outcomes in themeparks are generally winning pvp matches, gaining a lot of gold, not dieing when you attempt to get better gear, explore the world, etc. All of which are ways to win the game and even have undesirable outcomes like if you head to a pve dungeon and there's some enemy players camping the door. Losing gold from bad purchases. Acquiring gear has undesirable outcomes that is tied to your character like if your character dies on the boss and have to wait to fight him next time.
A virtual world where you are only able to interact with other players and things doesn't make something a full game. It only makes it a facet of a game. Design a game where you throw a ball back and forth to one another for example. You throw the ball, the ball goes to them, then they may throw the ball back at their leisure. This is a very weak game design. Now design an opposing force into the game such as that the other player may drop or not catch the ball. Whoever drops it, the other player gets +1 to their score. Now you have a stronger game design than before. Stronger game design does not mean that the weaker game design cannot be enjoyed. It means that it is better design overall because it completes it as a full game. This also has important effects on the players such as making them want to try harder at not dropping the ball, and giving the game an extra final score such as playing best 2 out of 3 or play until first to a score of 5 can give the game "closure" rather than just passing a ball back and forth with no other outcome or ending like you can find in a movie.
I think the real question here is "Is interaction without multiple outcomes good enough make a full game?" Well news media having trouble describing second life as a game probably doesn't make it so, but clearly games like it are closer to a 3D chat room than an actual game.
And no, before someone further questions that I disagree with the OP and the main subject of the thread, no. I don't. Just having a talk about why swg entertainer had weak game design and how it can be strengthened.
I seriously hope you aren't actually a game designer or that you'll stay away from any games I intend to play in the future.
If you can't understand that adding all the non combat profession in SWG was pure genius then get back to your books. I very often disagreed with quite a few takes made by Ralph Koster, but he got (or his team) this one pretty well on the nail.
Before you jump at me like "Elikal is going to poop another party!" hear me out. I am not a moralist or pacifist, while I'd define my ethics somewhat as "Chaotic Good" in terms of D&D, I am goody but not so much a "stick-to-the-rules". I can understand killing in games or MMOs are somewhat a "score", a bit like in sports.
What came to my mind these days is, how much narrowed the playstyles are these days. So my question could also be said as: "Why aren't there more MMOs with additional different playstyles other than being solider?"
When Vanguard was developed, many were excited about the Diplomacy part, and first it was promised to be a complete alternative path of gaming, and to many ppl it sounded very cool. Walking around as Diplomat rather than killer was a cool idea, but alas it never really happened.
Or one of the major reasons to love SWG: the many things non-violent you could do. I know a lot of people loved to be entertainers, myself included. It just added so much other things to do than killing. You could do very extensive crafting, be a harvester, trade, do haircuts for players, gather "pets" as Creature Handler, raise and sell every kind of animal, there were SO many things to do in SWG which were not killing, which was why I really loved SWG.
Or the LOTRO music: It always filled me with happyness to meet some group of players making some music event somewhere.
And one game I have to mention: Free Realms. Yes, its a kid game. But I really loved those non violent activities and while the game did not keep me, I wished many of these non violent activities were possible in my main AAA MMO of choice. Like being a real doctor and just healing people, or doing races or doing any of the fun stuff you could in Free Realms.
MMOs would have to do two things:
1) Include non-combat professions the way SWG did, as real professions not just hobbies.
2) Make quests with choices how you can solve it. Example: A group of bandits roams some streets in the wild. A soldier could just kill them, a "guard" would try to arrest them, a diplomat could persuade them or see they are just poor and help them to settle in an honest life. A spy could spy the rogues out for an ambush of the official forces. A strategist could lead them into a trap and magically ensnare them to give up. The quest would just contain "remove the bandits", and HOW you do that would be up to you entirely.
I mean, yes killing will always be a central part of the game; nothing to say here. But how much kill 2000000 of X has become an unquestioned norm these days is just unsettling, and in the end you are always just a soldier, a killing machine. So many helpless bears, boars and badgers... it is just tiring me.
Err, Vanguards diplomacy was an alternative path of development ? They only left out some plans they had for it. So you couldnt choose a diplomatic class.
But diplomacy was just like crafting. You could be a level 50 diplo or a level 50 crafter, but your adventuring level could still be 1.
I blame D&D. While combat happens in most P&P RPGs it is most common in D&D, other games have a lot more non combat things. In certain more realistic games are combat really dangerous and should be avoided at all cost.
In games like Call of Cthulu combat is usually fatal unless you fight some really wussy cultists and even that it is always dangerous.
But the thing is that combat is the simplest way to keep the players occupied. A stealth mission were combat means failure takes pretty long time to make. Problem solving is more or less destroyed by the net and so are riddles and puzzles.
There is of course the building thing, were the players can build great things together but even in most sandboxes it is usually just about choosing something out of a few basic things.
A few games have some minigames like jousting, archery contsests and similar things, I think those at least will become more common, GW2 plans to take them to the next level.
But I agree, MMOs should have more non combat activities. In most P&P fighting is really fun and exiting, but that is because you often do it pretty rarely. And you plan ahead with tactics and strategy in a very different way from MMOs.
More possibilities for non combat but no forcing of the players to do anything is the best way to go. Add a bit of dungeon keeper or the Sims to the game, a bit of strategy and more micro manegment.
Before you jump at me like "Elikal is going to poop another party!" hear me out. I am not a moralist or pacifist, while I'd define my ethics somewhat as "Chaotic Good" in terms of D&D, I am goody but not so much a "stick-to-the-rules". I can understand killing in games or MMOs are somewhat a "score", a bit like in sports.
What came to my mind these days is, how much narrowed the playstyles are these days. So my question could also be said as: "Why aren't there more MMOs with additional different playstyles other than being solider?"
When Vanguard was developed, many were excited about the Diplomacy part, and first it was promised to be a complete alternative path of gaming, and to many ppl it sounded very cool. Walking around as Diplomat rather than killer was a cool idea, but alas it never really happened.
Or one of the major reasons to love SWG: the many things non-violent you could do. I know a lot of people loved to be entertainers, myself included. It just added so much other things to do than killing. You could do very extensive crafting, be a harvester, trade, do haircuts for players, gather "pets" as Creature Handler, raise and sell every kind of animal, there were SO many things to do in SWG which were not killing, which was why I really loved SWG.
Or the LOTRO music: It always filled me with happyness to meet some group of players making some music event somewhere.
And one game I have to mention: Free Realms. Yes, its a kid game. But I really loved those non violent activities and while the game did not keep me, I wished many of these non violent activities were possible in my main AAA MMO of choice. Like being a real doctor and just healing people, or doing races or doing any of the fun stuff you could in Free Realms.
MMOs would have to do two things:
1) Include non-combat professions the way SWG did, as real professions not just hobbies.
2) Make quests with choices how you can solve it. Example: A group of bandits roams some streets in the wild. A soldier could just kill them, a "guard" would try to arrest them, a diplomat could persuade them or see they are just poor and help them to settle in an honest life. A spy could spy the rogues out for an ambush of the official forces. A strategist could lead them into a trap and magically ensnare them to give up. The quest would just contain "remove the bandits", and HOW you do that would be up to you entirely.
I mean, yes killing will always be a central part of the game; nothing to say here. But how much kill 2000000 of X has become an unquestioned norm these days is just unsettling, and in the end you are always just a soldier, a killing machine. So many helpless bears, boars and badgers... it is just tiring me.
Its all about killing because there is a lack of creativity in mmorpg genre. killing and combat sells to the masses. Corporate suits who only see dollar signs are controlling how these games are made.
I think the only reason we disagree is because I think your definition of a game is really the definition of a contest, Plasmicredx. You don't need an opposing force in a game all you need is: rules, challenge, interaction, and a goal. But you do need an opposing force in a contest.
Besides, an entertainer does have an opposing force, you just refuse to accept the opposing force as other players.
If a game is not a contest (no winner or loser), then all it is, is a linear sequential slideshow that leads to some outcome but you can't really say you won anything because you couldn't lose anything. It's more of an art program (like a lego game where the goal is to just build anything at all it doesn't matter) or a story book or movie.
I did already say an entertainer has an opposing force but it's a weak one. It's like a puzzle you just go play music and hope to get tips. There is no real winner or loser. If you didn't get tips that day it doesn't set you back in any way. You just keep going and playing music.
Why do you need to "win" anything? Why can't the enjoyment of whatever your doing be enough? If there has to be some type of "win" mechanic what about skill-ups- in the dancer example the more you use those skills the better you get at them?
This thread is something I've been complaining about for ages. I personally blame it on the industry still being male-dominated, as guys have a tendency towards competitive rather than cooperative.
This thread is something I've been complaining about for ages. I personally blame it on the industry still being male-dominated, as guys have a tendency towards competitive rather than cooperative.
MMOs should really have both these things, and you should choose what you prefer. It is just lazy devs that makes the games as easy as they can and focusing on combat is the easiest choice.
Comments
Thank you!
It is really insightful to see what goes on in the various areas of 'game design'.
Gdemami -
Informing people about your thoughts and impressions is not a review, it's a blog.
They are few very specific rpg games, some solo some mmo, that actually have different approch on killing. In some games building things is actually more important than destroying stuff, or kill stuff, but ye they are pretty rare, exceptions in fact. Those games are usually made by pationate designers, nothing even close to the lambda designer that might have a huge team and a montain of gold but who deliver such shallow and tasteless games. In fact few years ago i was pretty confident nothing really new could ever come come an already set game company, but some companies still manage to keep their unique feeling, so i think a bit otherwise now.
Anyway, there is a kind of "underground" gaming out there that offer something else, its not very easy to approach but actually if you are curious enough and are ready to accept strange ideas, it is worth it. But just like 99% of the designers are without imagination 99% of the gamers are just too close minded to even try those games, and even less to dedicate a bunch of hours trying to understand and learn them.
I think there is a thread somewhere in mmorpg forums that try to list all those strange games.
@OP An opposing force doesn't mean fighting/killing. An opposing force is anything the player interacts with in order to achieve a desirable outcome. A timer countdown while you attempt to finish a puzzle for instance is an opposing force. Has nothing to do with stabbing another player.
I have to disagree. A sandbox game forces the player to create their own goals in the game. A themepark game forces the player to play goals defined by the dev team. What was original SWG? Sandbox.
A sandbox still has goals. Short term goals like not dieing and exploring the immediate area. Long term goals like skilling up your character and discovering the layout of the entire game world. And an ultimate goal which is to give players the ultimate goal to achieve such as be the best rogue/thief, or to have the best castle or city, best warrior, etc.
Disagree. One can waste time and effort. I don't know about you, but trying to do something and not gatting anything out of it for hours is very frustating. There's no need to have a loss, if you can't get the reward, since not getting the reward is a loss. Which is much more strongly felt if it's the player's own goal. To obtain is as much of a goal as a pvper's goal is to kill.
I agree that too much loss frustrates players. I have been there in Dark Age of Camelot. Spent an entire day leveling and died a couple of times and lost it all. Some loss is still very important otherwise there is no loser and therefore it is not really a full game you are playing but a facet of a game. It's merely a sequential slideshow for an observer which makes you feel like you are playing a game because the outcome is always that you win something.
So.. you want social games to be harder than combat games? How's that even fair?
I didn't say social games, I said an innkeeper class in wow. I also said I want it to be just as hard.
I've got to disagree on this aswell. Look at Eve for example. You technically don't have to kill anything or anyone in it. Especially if you can lead, and talk charismatically, you can go a lot farther than if you just play as a pirate or a corporate mook. Corporate alliances, spying, theft, politics etc all require their own kind of skills, and aren't goals that are defined by anyone but the players.
Yes but in eve the "social" things you can do all have an opposing force like the threat of getting found out if you are a spy and getting hunted down and killed for doing so or hated. If you are a miner you have the threat of getting blown up by bandits and you only make money if you manage to sell your ores. Good game design.
Again, still disagree. There doesn't need to be an outside opposition for there to be a game. Solitaire is a game of chance, a Rubix cube is a puzzle game where the player's own mind is the limiting factor. I think you're definition of the word game differs from the actual definition.
Solitaire, if you play by the rules, has an opposing force that if you do not wisely make the right card choices, then you will run out of re-tries in the deck or get stuck without the right cards (and of course, by chance you can lose as well).
Your reference to puzzles/rubix cubes being games is a good one because you can spend as much time as you want to "win." It's also VERY challenging to beat a puzzle because of the time factor, but when was the last time puzzles made a video game I ask you? They don't sell well because puzzles alone without timer countdowns and other opposing forces don't make really interesting video games. Think about how successful Tetris is. Even games like Sierra Adventure games had opposing forces like items if you missed you completely lost the game or countdowns but were huge adventure puzzle games. Games like zelda were puzzle games implemented with opposing forces to prevent you from spending TOO much time figuring it out and these kinds of games always had immediate, short/long term, and ultimate goals with the ability to lose or get a high score or beat the dark lord and his minions.
I think the only reason we disagree is because I think your definition of a game is really the definition of a contest, Plasmicredx. You don't need an opposing force in a game all you need is: rules, challenge, interaction, and a goal. But you do need an opposing force in a contest.
Besides, an entertainer does have an opposing force, you just refuse to accept the opposing force as other players.
add: I suppose I should clearify. One doesn't need a contest in a game, and one doesn't need a game in a contest. Though they can overlap, and do often.
If a game is not a contest (no winner or loser), then all it is, is a linear sequential slideshow that leads to some outcome but you can't really say you won anything because you couldn't lose anything. It's more of an art program (like a lego game where the goal is to just build anything at all it doesn't matter) or a story book or movie.
I did already say an entertainer has an opposing force but it's a weak one. It's like a puzzle you just go play music and hope to get tips. There is no real winner or loser. If you didn't get tips that day it doesn't set you back in any way. You just keep going and playing music.
/tear, I miss SWG because of all those cool elements...
I think SWG did it best with the professions. Hanging out in coronet cantina was a blast when there were tons of people socializing. Or waiting in a buff life while chatting to the dude in front of you.
Or being friends with one of the best crafters on the server, and always having people bug me to introduce them to him so they could get good gear and possible benefits lol.
I believe Stargate World (R.I.P.) had non-combat mini-games for the tech and archaeolgy professions. As others have said, they need more non-combat profesions, like pre-NGE SWG, for this to succeed but unfortunately gaing companies only do combat. Maybe a good SciFi MMO would enable other non-combat professions to be utilized.
Why do you need to "win" anything? Why can't the enjoyment of whatever your doing be enough? If there has to be some type of "win" mechanic what about skill-ups- in the dancer example the more you use those skills the better you get at them?
You can always play the Sims Online.
It's not about winning. It's about there being a loser. I need to lose too. I'm a good loser and I get enjoyment out of losing because it makes me learn what I did wrong. Opposing forces cause the game to lead to an UNdesirable outcome, such as time running out on a puzzle and therefore I lose.
Again opposing force doesn't have to be killing other players. Which is why this information is beneficial to this thread. Using this info people can make games with strong game design that is not about killing people.
Why? Because that's where the market is. Developers aren't brave enough to think outside the box! Oh God, no.
By your definition Simon Says would be a puzzle and not a game. but for the opposite reason, there's no way to win, ever.
Weak to you. It's a definate conflict. If the entertainer sucks or is an ass, people won't give him money even if he had the best buffs. If the entertainer is good and very charismatic, that player could earn more from customers, just from impressing them. The goal is money. The challenge is social, mechanics, and visual skills. The conflict is or can be getting money, social standing, popularity, or even fans from the player populace as a whole. And this is not counting the competition between entertainers.
physically attacking is a rather local conflict as it can only injure 1 or a few people. Manipulation through words can afftect millions of people and the conflict becomes a broad. Game wise the entertainer's skill at atracting other players to pay them is a for of social manipulation. the losers would be those entertainers than can't attract people, or do worse than the entertainer across the street. The winners are the opposite. Being the local deva that other entertainers can't even compete against, or becoming highly renown amongst others is a definate reward.
Still that's a sandbox goal, as the devs don't define the goal, the player does.
On the grand scale though there are no winners in any MMO, as no one can beat the game. They can only do better than the rest, or achieve their goals. So, would an MMO itself be considered a game if you can't win?
While this debate could be considered a game so long as one of us concedes or gives up.
Simon Says
In Simon Says, the winner is the remaining player. The losers are the rest who didn't follow. The rules are that you keep playing, getting faster and faster and tricking people. The problem with simon says is that sometimes no one ever loses so the game eventually has to stop. If you never encountered that in simon says like I did, then you must have not played it enough times. That was a flaw in its game design, but it was a good strong game design because it does have winners and losers.
Again, entertainer in swg is not weak because I think it's weak. It's weak because it puts the game on a sequential track where you may ONLY advance forward to a progressive outcome like a puzzle with no setting the player back at all unlike simon says where if you lose, then you don't get to be simon says for next round. You can't be a musician entertainer in swg and lose. You are also leaving out the fact that even if you are incredibly good at being an entertainer, even if you are the best, that players can still decide not to tip you. So in order to play an entertainer in swg, you must be willing to accept that the game has no design in place for this. "Bad" entertainers can still make money or even make more money than the best entertainers because it's based on player choice.
Winning a game comes from getting any sorts of desirable outcomes (as long as there is an undesirable outcome for each winnable outcome). You might win at short term goals and this is still considered winning a small amount as long as you could have lost. There are multiple desirable outcomes in sandbox and mmorpg games. The ultimate desirable outcome in wow is to defeat the dark lord and his minions. You can lose this ultimate goal by getting killed by the dark lord. The dark lord usually changes every expansion pack. Though some people don't even bother with the ultimate goal.
Some are satisfied with shorter goals. But the ultimate goal is there which is why it's good game design. In sandboxes you still can have an ultimate goal to defeat a dark lord. What makes a sandbox is nonlinear gameplay which allows the players to do anything they want. Being able to write your own world is impossible without uploadable community content, and even this is still playing some player's story he wrote for you.
If there is no conflict at all and no monsters to defeat or players to defeat then there's just an empty world with no history. If you allow players to play as monsters and form civilizations, then and only then can players start to write their own sandbox while playing the game, but even then, the game is being written within some sort of context: medieval fantasy, sci-fi, western, a mix of all, and others. Sandboxes I've seen always had pvp and pve unless it was an art program (not a real game) like second life. So even though you are free to do whatever you want in most real sandbox games, there is always some discoverable desirable or undesirable outcome. Some of the goals are to be the best at pvp or pve, acquire the most stuff, build destructible castles from lots of resource gathering, etc. What if someone blows up your castle in your sandbox?
Other desirable outcomes in themeparks are generally winning pvp matches, gaining a lot of gold, not dieing when you attempt to get better gear, explore the world, etc. All of which are ways to win the game and even have undesirable outcomes like if you head to a pve dungeon and there's some enemy players camping the door. Losing gold from bad purchases. Acquiring gear has undesirable outcomes that is tied to your character like if your character dies on the boss and have to wait to fight him next time.
A virtual world where you are only able to interact with other players and things doesn't make something a full game. It only makes it a facet of a game. Design a game where you throw a ball back and forth to one another for example. You throw the ball, the ball goes to them, then they may throw the ball back at their leisure. This is a very weak game design. Now design an opposing force into the game such as that the other player may drop or not catch the ball. Whoever drops it, the other player gets +1 to their score. Now you have a stronger game design than before. Stronger game design does not mean that the weaker game design cannot be enjoyed. It means that it is better design overall because it completes it as a full game. This also has important effects on the players such as making them want to try harder at not dropping the ball, and giving the game an extra final score such as playing best 2 out of 3 or play until first to a score of 5 can give the game "closure" rather than just passing a ball back and forth with no other outcome or ending like you can find in a movie.
I think the real question here is "Is interaction without multiple outcomes good enough make a full game?" Well news media having trouble describing second life as a game probably doesn't make it so, but clearly games like it are closer to a 3D chat room than an actual game.
And no, before someone further questions that I disagree with the OP and the main subject of the thread, no. I don't. Just having a talk about why swg entertainer had weak game design and how it can be strengthened.
In COH you actually arrest them ! woot no killing...
I seriously hope you aren't actually a game designer or that you'll stay away from any games I intend to play in the future.
If you can't understand that adding all the non combat profession in SWG was pure genius then get back to your books. I very often disagreed with quite a few takes made by Ralph Koster, but he got (or his team) this one pretty well on the nail.
Short answer: Developers lack imagination.
How about 'this works!'?
Rome can be built in a day if dreamed/talked/written about but those in the real-world knows the cost (financial esp) of such things.
Gdemami -
Informing people about your thoughts and impressions is not a review, it's a blog.
Why are sport games always about scoring?
Err, Vanguards diplomacy was an alternative path of development ? They only left out some plans they had for it. So you couldnt choose a diplomatic class.
But diplomacy was just like crafting. You could be a level 50 diplo or a level 50 crafter, but your adventuring level could still be 1.
I blame D&D. While combat happens in most P&P RPGs it is most common in D&D, other games have a lot more non combat things. In certain more realistic games are combat really dangerous and should be avoided at all cost.
In games like Call of Cthulu combat is usually fatal unless you fight some really wussy cultists and even that it is always dangerous.
But the thing is that combat is the simplest way to keep the players occupied. A stealth mission were combat means failure takes pretty long time to make. Problem solving is more or less destroyed by the net and so are riddles and puzzles.
There is of course the building thing, were the players can build great things together but even in most sandboxes it is usually just about choosing something out of a few basic things.
A few games have some minigames like jousting, archery contsests and similar things, I think those at least will become more common, GW2 plans to take them to the next level.
But I agree, MMOs should have more non combat activities. In most P&P fighting is really fun and exiting, but that is because you often do it pretty rarely. And you plan ahead with tactics and strategy in a very different way from MMOs.
More possibilities for non combat but no forcing of the players to do anything is the best way to go. Add a bit of dungeon keeper or the Sims to the game, a bit of strategy and more micro manegment.
Its all about killing because there is a lack of creativity in mmorpg genre. killing and combat sells to the masses. Corporate suits who only see dollar signs are controlling how these games are made.
This thread is something I've been complaining about for ages. I personally blame it on the industry still being male-dominated, as guys have a tendency towards competitive rather than cooperative.
MMOs should really have both these things, and you should choose what you prefer. It is just lazy devs that makes the games as easy as they can and focusing on combat is the easiest choice.