Mesmer? Look at the female Elementalist. It's a little hilarious.
Yeah, it can get a little silly, but take out too much 'leather and lace' - style armor and the game's no fun anymore. I'm not just talking about women here - I prefer my guys to look classy and comfortable while they magic someone's face off. And in a world as absurdly danger-filled as an MMO, with countless, very conspicuous adventurers, I think they'd work hard to make armor both durable and distinguishing.
As long as everything vital is covered up, I can believe it.
Otherwise, I like the ideas presented here. A stamina system would make getting from outpost to outpost more meaningful, and add a layer of danger and excitement to exploring the wilderness. Removing indoor mounts would force designers to come up with ever more creative ways of providing easy access to the necessities (functional design is a personal interest of mine). More children and elderly NPCs would help supplement the apparently huge populace of younger- to middle- aged adventurers running around. It would give the player a sense of their past and future. At the moment, I just try not to wince too much at those absurdly huge weapons... It's a little pathetic really.
I cant' say I disagree with any of them. I particularly hate the size of weapons in most MMOs these days. If warriors wielded those things they died fromexhasution before any mob had a chance to stab them in the back.
I'd certainly like to see more kids in the worlds of MMOs, and I don't mean inhabiting chat channels and talking crap. They don't even need to be an interactive part of the world, but just there adding flavour to things. I recall in Vanguard's gnome city there were some kids that would run around the town center and seemed to be playing a game. You could chat to them and sort of join in. It really added a feel to the world...even if no one else was in the city with you.
If Guild Wars 2 can recapture the feel of a real life hustling and bustling city, like MMOs of old used to, and add in realistic day to day lives of its inhabitants then I will be forever in the laps of NC Soft. Please make it so.
You'll never win the argument to dress females in proper armor on this site. Men just don't get why we women object to our avatars being dressed like harlots. If I hear " it's a fantasy world" one more time I will break my keyboard. The real immersion breaker for me is high heels. Really? Practical monster hunting shoes? Women can barely walk in high heels, let alone fight monsters.
The real problem isn't how many gamers are men or women, its how many game developers are men. They are the ones creating these ridiculous outfits. Please, at least give us a choice for non-whorish armor, so those guys who do want to play streetwalkers stll can, and those who want a warrior woman can have that too.
No, this is the part I find hilarious actually, it's more often the -women- than the men who jump to defend bikini plate.
I, as a male, personally prefer actual.. armor on my characters, hell, in a face off, I'd honestly find a fully armored character a bit more 'attractive' than a bikini-plate one, I mean, at least they look like they have some inkling of how combat works and aren't just some idiot WITH MAGICAL FORCEFIELD ARMOR BECAUSE IT'S SECKSY RIGHT?
There was a post on the riftjunkie forums around the aweful.. bikini nature of female armor in rift, and the first four or five pages were mostly -female- players jumping to defend it because "they play an MMO to get away from life, they have to wear business dress at work all day, why would they want their avatars to cover up"
You know what is really ironic about this is how we have been pining for years to have these things taken care of, no MMOrpg dev team has made a fix to any of this. What makes this ironic is that before we had MMOrpg's we had plain old SINGLE player rpg's and none of them (that I know of) have made any of these transgressions.
Somewhat off topic; most MMO's it seems, do infact have a lot of problems that single player games do not, which makes you wonder why no-one has bothered to take elements from single player games in order to make the multiplayer ones better.
Point of fact, I will not be continuing my subscription with rift, nor will I be subscribing to any other MMO, not even GW2, simply because I will be too busy slaying dragons and other beasts in the far superior SINGLE player rpg, TES V: Skyrim.
You won't be running anywhere, because you will be able to play the game at whatever speed you like. I have not seen any children in any screenshots, but I'm sure there will be some, and I have seen videos showing townsfolk walking around town and doing things. Mounts are definitely a nono indoors, and gstrings don't exist, and every weapon in the game will be realistic.
These are all things the last elderscrolls games (and others dating as far back as Ocarina of Time), have done, yet the MMO side is still lagging behind. There are a lot of things in single player games that would still work well in a multiplayer environment, yet it seems that devs are still pushing multiplayer content instead of taking a step forward in the single player content to bridge the gap between the epic gameplay that single player games have and the overly redundant "kill X of this", "go get me that", and "do this stuff for me so that I don't have have to, because I'm a lazy bum who doesn't want to do anything" quests that mmo's have been using for decades.
Lol, neither of those points I would include in my list. There would be things like sworing and childish behavior in local, loading screen, bad animation, etc
I tried and I came up with a pair of red lips with orange lines coming from the lips (like Banshee from the Xmen or like Sindel from Mortal Kombat) bouncing up and down riding on top of a cloud with electrical currents flowing around it while scenes play out on the cloud like a movie or tv show.
Was a bad example you gave I guess oO!
You're not picturing an orange scream bouncing on top of an electrocuted dream.
You're picturing a pair of red lips with orange lines coming from them bouncing up and down riding on top of a cloud with electrical currents flowing around it while screnes play out on the cloud like a movie or TV show.
Lines aren't screams. Clouds aren't dreams.
You're using symbolism to represent them, but that isn't the same as actually picturing them.
We are the bunny. Resistance is futile. ''/\/\'''''/\/\''''''/\/\ ( o.o) ( o.o) ( o.o) (")("),,(")("),(")(")
While there are a lot more females in games these days, more then the average person thinks, they are still largly in the minority so the guys wanting to see the sexy still applys but, then most of the kids I encounter playing don't seem to know what a female is anyway.
As far as the eveing wear, that is obviously there for the role players, if someone is going to take the time to try to set up an engaging formal dinner in a mmo, don't laugh I have seen hard core role players do this, they don't want you clunking around there dinner engagment wearing battle armor.
Running, well here is the thing, most games have the option to switch to walking but, the kids that play the games these days don't even want to tke the few moments it takes to read the quest log. Go into any mmo and without doubt in the new player area there are tons of people walking around and hollering in chat about not being able to find something and in most cases if they had read there quest it told them where to find what they were looking for.
One of the most glaring examples of this that comes to mind is STO, one of the new player missions was " talk to sulu" if you read the quest log it told you that sulu was in the admirals office, when you beamed into the star base right in front of the only beam in point was a huge neon like sign that said "admirals office" yet for months people ran around the station hollering "where do I find sulu?!?!"
Sadly people don't want to taake the time to enjoy an mmo they all think that rushing to the highest possible lvl is the only way to do things. It is a sad trend but no the less a reality.
I hate it when this topic is brought up. Expecially when it is slipped into a larger article and simply expected to be accepted at face value. Fine, here is my 2 cents.
Another way to understand both the clothing, lack of it, posing and general hyper sexualization is in just that. It is generally taking the appealing characteristics of a character and greatly emphasizing them. This is done a lot of in comic books. But it goes both way. Yes women are put in sexy poses and given big racks and curvy backsides because it emphasizes what we already see as beautiful and takes it to an idealistic extreme. Unrealistic? sure but then it is a comic or cartoon or game so it is not really meant to come across as realistic.
But we also need to see that the same is done with men. Wait men are not posed like women. Of course not, because men are expected to bring across different characteristics. Strength, confidence, courage. Why are superheroes always rippling with an unrealistic amount of muscles? How is this supposed to make most men feel? We can't live up to that kind of expectation. But that is fine. this is simply depicting an idealized extreme not a realistic life goal.
But wait, we are supposed to treat men and women the same. Yeah, that is even more idealistic. Men and women simply are different. We see them differently and each gender also sees themselves and the other differently. but then I thought diversity was a good thing. I guess only if it is the right kind of diversity.
As far as I have been able to catch it. I think the problem that guys, and not always teen boys, (another sexist assumption?) is that every were we go the media is being taken over and we are getting pushed out. 85% of television marketing is targeted toward females, you want to know why? We have been largely pushed out of the television market we are being further marginalized from the film market. Is it any wonder why so many men now find a significant portion of there entertainment in video games? For a great many of us, all we want is to be left alone to enjoy what we enjoy rather than having to confirm to some puritanical set of standards imposed by feminists. If you want to make video games that appeal to girls then great, make them. If we think they are fun then we might by them too. But quite getting all bent when we don't find the "acceptable" games very enjoyable. We are male and that means we are largely visual in our tastes. Get over it.
Another way to understand both the clothing, lack of it, posing and general hyper sexualization is in just that. It is generally taking the appealing characteristics of a character and greatly emphasizing them. This is done a lot of in comic books. But it goes both way. Yes women are put in sexy poses and given big racks and curvy backsides because it emphasizes what we already see as beautiful and takes it to an idealistic extreme. Unrealistic? sure but then it is a comic or cartoon or game so it is not really meant to come across as realistic.
But we also need to see that the same is done with men. Wait men are not posed like women. Of course not, because men are expected to bring across different characteristics. Strength, confidence, courage. Why are superheroes always rippling with an unrealistic amount of muscles? How is this supposed to make most men feel? We can't live up to that kind of expectation. But that is fine. this is simply depicting an idealized extreme not a realistic life goal.
But wait, we are supposed to treat men and women the same. Yeah, that is even more idealistic. Men and women simply are different. We see them differently and each gender also sees themselves and the other differently. but then I thought diversity was a good thing. I guess only if it is the right diversity.
As far as I have been able to catch it. I think the problem that guys, and not always teen boys, (another sexist assumption?) is that every were we go the media is being taken over and we are getting pushed out. 85% of television marketing is targeted toward females, you want to know why? We have been largely pushed out of the television market we are being further marginalized from the film market. Is it any wonder why so many men now find a significant portion of there entertainment in video games? For a great many of us, all we want is to be left alone to enjoy what we enjoy rather than having to confirm to some puritanical set of standards imposed by feminists. If you want to make video games that appeal to girls then great, make them. If we think they are fun then we might by them too. But quite getting all bent when we don't find the "acceptable" games very enjoyable. We are male and that means we are largely visual in our tastes. Get over it.
and what is the fixation on high heels? Goblins and fireballs are realistic but high heels are not? I know some women can move around on those dang things pretty quickly and in a tight business skirt. Rather amazing really. And while I wouldn't expect her to swing a broad sword very well wearing such stuff, fact is, most people wouldn't swing a broad sword very well anyway, even when wearing sweats and crosstrainers.
There is very little in game combat that is realistic. Why? Because real life makes for a pretty sucky game. That's why we need rules and legal strike zones and pads and helmets and such when we try to turn in into a sport. And it will only get more unrealistic from their as you move into virtual worlds. Are high heels unrealistic? Absolutely, but high heels are also hardly the tipping point. Its not like the combat is studdenly tremendously more realistic with the one change. High heels are not there because they are realistic or not, they are there because they look good.
I never get immersed in MMO's or any video game for that matter. As soon as I log in, I'm greeted by a big UI overlay displaying my characters health, MP, XP etc. There's also this chat box where people often talk about things completely unrelated to the game.
I didn't read through the entire comments, so I don't know if someone posted this, but to the people saying that most game developers are men in response to the Guild Wars inspired #2, it was the female developers who designed it.
I never minded it, but that's because I probably approach MMO's, especially Guild Wars, from a different view. Immersion takes a backseat or supplementary role to fun and what something looks like. I mean, if it's cool and fits the world, then awesome. If it's cool and doesn't fit, it's whatever- It still looks cool!
And I mean, really, if you can deal with the completely immersion shattering ability for players to just disappear to anywhere they want in the game in the blink of an eye, then in what attire players carry themselves into battle with can't be too bad. I deal with the map travel thing because it lets me play with my friends and get into the action sooner.
Guess it's just differences in fun priorities? -shrug-
I'm guilty of rushing everywhere and riding my mount into whatever building will have me unless it's crowded, in which case I'll be polite and dismount.
I hate high heels in an MMO. Sometimes it's okay on casters, but on warriors and rogues, no. Twisting and ankle right when you were going in for the kill is not sexy or cute.
Yes, I know it's not supposed to be realistic, I know I'm quibbling over footwear in games where my character can run around on the ceiling, fly, or shoot fire out of her hands, but it doesn't matter. High heels bother me.
I can tolerate some skin or otherwise feminine clothing, but even my DCUO female character in the mini skirt is wearing flat heeled boots.
But the biggest immersion breaker for me so far has always been VOIP. I avoid it whenever it's practical because I cannot concentrate on enjoying game play while in voice chat with other people. The only time I find it useful is in pvp, since I don't care for raiding.
I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate these grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist economy, accompanied by an educational system which would be oriented toward social goals.
That second half didn't help your case thus it was discarded. Immersion is already a state, no such thing as "such a state", you're just making things up.
You immerse yourself into a world where everything is fantastic NOT realistic. The problem I have with games is when more and more realistic stuff are getting into the fantastic world.
Fantastically huge weapons, impenetrable bikini armor, 1-ton tower shield, etc all are good for immersion because you no longer in real world, you are in a fantasy world.
But it seems that is difficult for you to grasp so let me put it this way--the reality in the game world allows you to have exagerrated gears, so why are you going against that reality and not simply accept it?
Yup immersion is already a state. Such a state where you pretend something is real.
You forget that all the fantastic has a basis in reality, and that basis is what allows us to immerse ourselves.
Huge weapons have a basis in reality, normal weapons. Bikini armor has a basis in reality, normal bikinis. etc.
It's not the fantastical aspect that allows immersion, it's the realistical aspect. You can't immerse yourself in something that holds no realistical aspect. You can roleplay a modern soldier. Because he actually exists in reality. You can roleplay an orc, a brutish green-skinned humanoid. Because he's got a basis in reality. You can't roleplay a liquid birthday with the colour of amnesia. Because that has no basis in reality whatsoever.
Something requires a realistical aspect for anyone to immerse themselves in it. Without any basis in reality you can't connect to it and you can't immerse yourself in it.
The more realism the easier it is to immerse yourself in something. Whether or not you personally find it fun to immerse yourself in things very close to reality is another matter entirely.
But it's downright ridiculous to say that the more fantastical, improbable and impossible something is the better it is for immersion. Without a basis in reality there is no immersion.
That's exactly the reason why the recent games lacks creativity. They're so rooted into reality that it became difficult for them to create a game that is fantastic.
If everything has a bearing to reality, then what realistic bearing does a Beholder has? Or let's make it simple, super power that makes you fly? Or anything that defies logic and physics for that matter?
You see, in a fantasy world, real world logic and physics need not to exist.
Sure you can "pretend" all you want, but pretending is not immersing. When you immerse yourself in water, you're not simply pretending to be in water, you are in water.
Your idea of immersion is like having one foot outside the door, which is rooted to what you call reality.
A beholder has eyes, like those you have in reality. Those eyes work exactly the same as you'd expect eyes to work. They're not some fantastical construct, they're real eyes.
A beholder has a mouth, like you have in reality. It works exactly as you'd expect a mouth to work. It's also got teeth which also work exactly as you'd expect teeth to work.
Sure, they've added a few twists like shooting beams of fire (which also have a basis in reality) from the eyes but everything has a root in reality.
Flying certainly has a basis in reality. Just look outside your window. Lots of birds flying. Lots of planes flying. Simply apply that completely realistical concept to another completely realistical concept, a person, and you've got a flying person. Again, both are rooted in reality.
In a fantasy world most real world logic and physics do exist. How many MMOs do not have gravity? How many MMOs do not have trees? How many MMOs do not have suns? How many MMOs do not have causality (how do you even build an MMO without causality)? How many MMOs have fire that doesn't burn? How many MMOs have ice that doesn't freeze?
It's all rooted in reality. You can't escape reality. It's the only thing our brains are able to process. If it isn't rooted in reality we're not able to process it. Just try picturing what an orange scream bouncing on top of an electrocuted dream looks like, you can't because it's got no basis in reality. There's no frame of reference. You need a frame of reference.
If it isn't rooted in reality you can't imagine it. If you can't imagine it you can't immerse yourself in it.
ps. Immersion as relating to water has absolutely nothing to do with immersion as relating to fantasy worlds. Just like right as relating to left has nothing to do with right as relating to wrong. It's a homonym.
lol, an eye that shoots laser. Man flying like birds without wings. All based on reality? That's why I said, games these days are lacking creativity. Thanks for proving that.
"Just try picturing what an orange scream bouncing on top of an electrocuted dream looks like, you can't because it's got no basis in reality."
Of course I can, because I have a creative mind. The problem with your description of something abstract is you are using words that describe something that is physical like "orange" (either color or fruit, still physical), "bouncing", "on top of", etc. And no, you don't need a frame of reference. To fully immerse yourself, you need to be willing to throw away those "rules", it is hindering yourself from full immersion.
"Picturing" requires imagination and imagination doesn't need to be rooted to reality. As I've said, you have one foot outside the door that prevents you from fully immersing yourself.
You're a realist I get that...seeing realistic features in game simply breaks immersion to me.
If you think about it, you are not immersing yourself into the game world. Rather you are extending reality into the game world because you cannot muster yourself diving in, head first, and fully immersing yourself. You are looking for your own frame of reference, which is one foot outside the door, which by trying to make sense of everything, you are pulling yourself out of the game world.
The sad part is, the geme developers are targetting a market with your mind set -- the result, lack of creativity -- because it's too easy to simply based everything in reality, so why work harder...
You guys are completely missing one huge point. Each game/movie/book has a tone and setting that varies in its realism or fantacism. Each world establishes its own set of rules. Immersion breaks when the game throws in a scene, character, or event that is inconsistent with the rest of the game's tone.
Now it may be so that individuals vary in their preference for realism or the fantastic; and it may be so that such intensely polarized individuals find it impossible to become immersed when one game caters too strongly to the opposite end of the spectrum. And that's fine. Such is the nature of personal preferences. But for those who aren't so polarized that they simply cannot get immersed in games that lean heavily in one direction or the other, the primary factor that disrupts immersion (as far as these categories of realism versus fantacism are concerned) is not that the game is too realistic or fantastic, but rather that the game is not consistently realistic or fantastic in tone. Imagine a light-hearted "Harry Potter" moment being tossed in the middle of a vulgar, sexually explicit scene of "A Song of Ice and Fire," or even worse, imagine the reverse! Both stories and styles are capable of being plenty immersive in their own right, but if either wavers in their tone and style, they risk breaking the reader/viewer's immersion.
A game can be ridiculously fantastical. As long as it remains consistently fantastical, players can remain immersed. WoW, for example, strikes me as being consistently whimsical and "cartoony" (as it is often described) in its overall aesthetic approach and story. The same thing goes for a game grounded in strict realism. As long as, say, a Disney faerie doesn't emerge from a knight's helm in a dark medeival setting, players should be able to remain immersed.
I agree on all points, bugs me just as it does you. Also bugs me that I keep hearing the 'guys all want the women in thier games (un)Dressed this way. Im a male whos very intrested in the female body(Looking ) but It bugs me when some chickie in high heels and about as much coverage as I have on my left hand, has the same defensive ability as the full head-to-toe steel fullplate I've got on.
Sure let us strip down and show off, but in combat I much prefer 'real' looking gear. (Another thing bugs me is the 'chest slider' idea where ALL women seem to have 15 lb sacks tied to thier chest, its unrelistic and, imo, not attractive.)
If a game caters those who love half naked women or ridiculously huge weapons, I don't really mind.
Just let them make it optional and don't make the best armour look like bikinis or the best weapons look ridiculously unrealistic so you're more or less forced into that specific look and feel. Let the game offer choice so it caters all kinds of people. Roleplaying guilds or those who like realism may find themselves at home and make themselves stand out by a specific style, as well as all the others like manga lovers - or wow style/size shoulderpads fetisjists. :-)
Why not have and/and instead of or/or? I think game developers systematically underestimate the effect of the customisation choices their game has to offer. To be able to make a character look and wear whatever you fancy wearing him/her is very important for the immersion of a significant part of their potential playerbase.
That's what I think guildwars partially succeeded in doing, by making looks independent from stats. It was just the female elementalists that really had very little choice, and yes, mesmers still couldn't do without heels either. And so on, it still was quite limited. I hope GW2 won't make that mistake and make the variety far bigger.
As for a living, breating, realistic world it would indeed be nice if a fantasy world would feel like it.
You guys are completely missing one huge point. Each game/movie/book has a tone and setting that varies in its realism or fantacism. Each world establishes its own set of rules. Immersion breaks when the game throws in a scene, character, or event that is inconsistent with the rest of the game's tone.
Now it may be so that individuals vary in their preference for realism or the fantastic; and it may be so that such intensely polarized individuals find it impossible to become immersed when one game caters too strongly to the opposite end of the spectrum. And that's fine. Such is the nature of personal preferences. But for those who aren't so polarized that they simply cannot get immersed in games that lean heavily in one direction or the other, the primary factor that disrupts immersion (as far as these categories of realism versus fantacism are concerned) is not that the game is too realistic or fantastic, but rather that the game is not consistently realistic or fantastic in tone. Imagine a light-hearted "Harry Potter" moment being tossed in the middle of a vulgar, sexually explicit scene of "A Song of Ice and Fire," or even worse, imagine the reverse! Both stories and styles are capable of being plenty immersive in their own right, but if either wavers in their tone and style, they risk breaking the reader/viewer's immersion.
A game can be ridiculously fantastical. As long as it remains consistently fantastical, players can remain immersed. WoW, for example, strikes me as being consistently whimsical and "cartoony" (as it is often described) in its overall aesthetic approach and story. The same thing goes for a game grounded in strict realism. As long as, say, a Disney faerie doesn't emerge from a knight's helm in a dark medeival setting, players should be able to remain immersed.
I'm not talking about the setting.
I'm talking about the deeper underlying realism.
Concepts in fantasy need to have a realistic link. We need to have something somewhere in actual reality that it links to.
Dragons for example do not exist. However they do have scales, which do exist. They have wings, which do exist. They breathe fire, which does exist. etc.
A dragon is nothing more then an unrealistic mix of completely realistical concepts. Everything in fantasy is an unrealistic mix of realistic concepts. Because if it doesn't have a base in reality then our brains are simply incapable of comprehending it.
Even the most fantastical concepts can be broken down into an unrealistic mix of realistic concepts.
Furthermore there are various primal concepts that we simply expect and if they're not there then the game will feel wrong. Just look at things like animations, we expect things to move a certain way; based on reality. If they don't move that way then they just feel horribly wrong. We expect things to have momentum as they do in reality. We expect sound to work as it does in reality. etc.
All these things that lie at the basis of our own reality are just as vital in even the most fantastical worlds.
No setting, no matter how fantastical, becomes better by changing or even removing how these basic concepts work. Making sounds equally loud no matter the distance doesn't improve any setting. Removing all sense of momentum from every animation doesn't improve any setting. Introducing fantastical objects without providing any realistical frame of reference to describe them doesn't improve any setting.
We are the bunny. Resistance is futile. ''/\/\'''''/\/\''''''/\/\ ( o.o) ( o.o) ( o.o) (")("),,(")("),(")(")
Comments
Mesmer? Look at the female Elementalist. It's a little hilarious.
Yeah, it can get a little silly, but take out too much 'leather and lace' - style armor and the game's no fun anymore. I'm not just talking about women here - I prefer my guys to look classy and comfortable while they magic someone's face off. And in a world as absurdly danger-filled as an MMO, with countless, very conspicuous adventurers, I think they'd work hard to make armor both durable and distinguishing.
As long as everything vital is covered up, I can believe it.
Otherwise, I like the ideas presented here. A stamina system would make getting from outpost to outpost more meaningful, and add a layer of danger and excitement to exploring the wilderness. Removing indoor mounts would force designers to come up with ever more creative ways of providing easy access to the necessities (functional design is a personal interest of mine). More children and elderly NPCs would help supplement the apparently huge populace of younger- to middle- aged adventurers running around. It would give the player a sense of their past and future. At the moment, I just try not to wince too much at those absurdly huge weapons... It's a little pathetic really.
I cant' say I disagree with any of them. I particularly hate the size of weapons in most MMOs these days. If warriors wielded those things they died fromexhasution before any mob had a chance to stab them in the back.
I'd certainly like to see more kids in the worlds of MMOs, and I don't mean inhabiting chat channels and talking crap. They don't even need to be an interactive part of the world, but just there adding flavour to things. I recall in Vanguard's gnome city there were some kids that would run around the town center and seemed to be playing a game. You could chat to them and sort of join in. It really added a feel to the world...even if no one else was in the city with you.
If Guild Wars 2 can recapture the feel of a real life hustling and bustling city, like MMOs of old used to, and add in realistic day to day lives of its inhabitants then I will be forever in the laps of NC Soft. Please make it so.
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Agree with all points. #2 I absolutely loathe.
No, this is the part I find hilarious actually, it's more often the -women- than the men who jump to defend bikini plate.
I, as a male, personally prefer actual.. armor on my characters, hell, in a face off, I'd honestly find a fully armored character a bit more 'attractive' than a bikini-plate one, I mean, at least they look like they have some inkling of how combat works and aren't just some idiot WITH MAGICAL FORCEFIELD ARMOR BECAUSE IT'S SECKSY RIGHT?
There was a post on the riftjunkie forums around the aweful.. bikini nature of female armor in rift, and the first four or five pages were mostly -female- players jumping to defend it because "they play an MMO to get away from life, they have to wear business dress at work all day, why would they want their avatars to cover up"
No, literally.
http://www.riftjunkies.com/forums/news-rift-junkies/1846-ear-rift-put-some-clothes.html
(not sure if it's ok to link outside sites, if so, mod.. remove!)
Read the first page or so.
.. kind of sad, really.
You know what is really ironic about this is how we have been pining for years to have these things taken care of, no MMOrpg dev team has made a fix to any of this. What makes this ironic is that before we had MMOrpg's we had plain old SINGLE player rpg's and none of them (that I know of) have made any of these transgressions.
Somewhat off topic; most MMO's it seems, do infact have a lot of problems that single player games do not, which makes you wonder why no-one has bothered to take elements from single player games in order to make the multiplayer ones better.
Point of fact, I will not be continuing my subscription with rift, nor will I be subscribing to any other MMO, not even GW2, simply because I will be too busy slaying dragons and other beasts in the far superior SINGLE player rpg, TES V: Skyrim.
You won't be running anywhere, because you will be able to play the game at whatever speed you like. I have not seen any children in any screenshots, but I'm sure there will be some, and I have seen videos showing townsfolk walking around town and doing things. Mounts are definitely a nono indoors, and gstrings don't exist, and every weapon in the game will be realistic.
These are all things the last elderscrolls games (and others dating as far back as Ocarina of Time), have done, yet the MMO side is still lagging behind. There are a lot of things in single player games that would still work well in a multiplayer environment, yet it seems that devs are still pushing multiplayer content instead of taking a step forward in the single player content to bridge the gap between the epic gameplay that single player games have and the overly redundant "kill X of this", "go get me that", and "do this stuff for me so that I don't have have to, because I'm a lazy bum who doesn't want to do anything" quests that mmo's have been using for decades.
Lol, neither of those points I would include in my list. There would be things like sworing and childish behavior in local, loading screen, bad animation, etc
You're not picturing an orange scream bouncing on top of an electrocuted dream.
You're picturing a pair of red lips with orange lines coming from them bouncing up and down riding on top of a cloud with electrical currents flowing around it while screnes play out on the cloud like a movie or TV show.
Lines aren't screams. Clouds aren't dreams.
You're using symbolism to represent them, but that isn't the same as actually picturing them.
We are the bunny.
Resistance is futile.
''/\/\'''''/\/\''''''/\/\
( o.o) ( o.o) ( o.o)
(")("),,(")("),(")(")
5)Victorian era clothing/armor style in my mmo (aion).
4)World wide chat instead of local only or trade in towns.
3)Seeing items that can only be recieved through a plex gameshop.
2)Glitches & bugs found ingame.
1)Asia in my mmo. Keep your pandas, pagodas and all that mess out of my fantasy mmo. (ultima online, Vanguard, WoW, etc)
While there are a lot more females in games these days, more then the average person thinks, they are still largly in the minority so the guys wanting to see the sexy still applys but, then most of the kids I encounter playing don't seem to know what a female is anyway.
As far as the eveing wear, that is obviously there for the role players, if someone is going to take the time to try to set up an engaging formal dinner in a mmo, don't laugh I have seen hard core role players do this, they don't want you clunking around there dinner engagment wearing battle armor.
Running, well here is the thing, most games have the option to switch to walking but, the kids that play the games these days don't even want to tke the few moments it takes to read the quest log. Go into any mmo and without doubt in the new player area there are tons of people walking around and hollering in chat about not being able to find something and in most cases if they had read there quest it told them where to find what they were looking for.
One of the most glaring examples of this that comes to mind is STO, one of the new player missions was " talk to sulu" if you read the quest log it told you that sulu was in the admirals office, when you beamed into the star base right in front of the only beam in point was a huge neon like sign that said "admirals office" yet for months people ran around the station hollering "where do I find sulu?!?!"
Sadly people don't want to taake the time to enjoy an mmo they all think that rushing to the highest possible lvl is the only way to do things. It is a sad trend but no the less a reality.
I hate it when this topic is brought up. Expecially when it is slipped into a larger article and simply expected to be accepted at face value. Fine, here is my 2 cents.
Another way to understand both the clothing, lack of it, posing and general hyper sexualization is in just that. It is generally taking the appealing characteristics of a character and greatly emphasizing them. This is done a lot of in comic books. But it goes both way. Yes women are put in sexy poses and given big racks and curvy backsides because it emphasizes what we already see as beautiful and takes it to an idealistic extreme. Unrealistic? sure but then it is a comic or cartoon or game so it is not really meant to come across as realistic.
But we also need to see that the same is done with men. Wait men are not posed like women. Of course not, because men are expected to bring across different characteristics. Strength, confidence, courage. Why are superheroes always rippling with an unrealistic amount of muscles? How is this supposed to make most men feel? We can't live up to that kind of expectation. But that is fine. this is simply depicting an idealized extreme not a realistic life goal.
But wait, we are supposed to treat men and women the same. Yeah, that is even more idealistic. Men and women simply are different. We see them differently and each gender also sees themselves and the other differently. but then I thought diversity was a good thing. I guess only if it is the right kind of diversity.
As far as I have been able to catch it. I think the problem that guys, and not always teen boys, (another sexist assumption?) is that every were we go the media is being taken over and we are getting pushed out. 85% of television marketing is targeted toward females, you want to know why? We have been largely pushed out of the television market we are being further marginalized from the film market. Is it any wonder why so many men now find a significant portion of there entertainment in video games? For a great many of us, all we want is to be left alone to enjoy what we enjoy rather than having to confirm to some puritanical set of standards imposed by feminists. If you want to make video games that appeal to girls then great, make them. If we think they are fun then we might by them too. But quite getting all bent when we don't find the "acceptable" games very enjoyable. We are male and that means we are largely visual in our tastes. Get over it.
Another way to understand both the clothing, lack of it, posing and general hyper sexualization is in just that. It is generally taking the appealing characteristics of a character and greatly emphasizing them. This is done a lot of in comic books. But it goes both way. Yes women are put in sexy poses and given big racks and curvy backsides because it emphasizes what we already see as beautiful and takes it to an idealistic extreme. Unrealistic? sure but then it is a comic or cartoon or game so it is not really meant to come across as realistic.
But we also need to see that the same is done with men. Wait men are not posed like women. Of course not, because men are expected to bring across different characteristics. Strength, confidence, courage. Why are superheroes always rippling with an unrealistic amount of muscles? How is this supposed to make most men feel? We can't live up to that kind of expectation. But that is fine. this is simply depicting an idealized extreme not a realistic life goal.
But wait, we are supposed to treat men and women the same. Yeah, that is even more idealistic. Men and women simply are different. We see them differently and each gender also sees themselves and the other differently. but then I thought diversity was a good thing. I guess only if it is the right diversity.
As far as I have been able to catch it. I think the problem that guys, and not always teen boys, (another sexist assumption?) is that every were we go the media is being taken over and we are getting pushed out. 85% of television marketing is targeted toward females, you want to know why? We have been largely pushed out of the television market we are being further marginalized from the film market. Is it any wonder why so many men now find a significant portion of there entertainment in video games? For a great many of us, all we want is to be left alone to enjoy what we enjoy rather than having to confirm to some puritanical set of standards imposed by feminists. If you want to make video games that appeal to girls then great, make them. If we think they are fun then we might by them too. But quite getting all bent when we don't find the "acceptable" games very enjoyable. We are male and that means we are largely visual in our tastes. Get over it.
All die, so die well.
and what is the fixation on high heels? Goblins and fireballs are realistic but high heels are not? I know some women can move around on those dang things pretty quickly and in a tight business skirt. Rather amazing really. And while I wouldn't expect her to swing a broad sword very well wearing such stuff, fact is, most people wouldn't swing a broad sword very well anyway, even when wearing sweats and crosstrainers.
There is very little in game combat that is realistic. Why? Because real life makes for a pretty sucky game. That's why we need rules and legal strike zones and pads and helmets and such when we try to turn in into a sport. And it will only get more unrealistic from their as you move into virtual worlds. Are high heels unrealistic? Absolutely, but high heels are also hardly the tipping point. Its not like the combat is studdenly tremendously more realistic with the one change. High heels are not there because they are realistic or not, they are there because they look good.
All die, so die well.
I never get immersed in MMO's or any video game for that matter. As soon as I log in, I'm greeted by a big UI overlay displaying my characters health, MP, XP etc. There's also this chat box where people often talk about things completely unrelated to the game.
5) Backpack helecopters (damn you WaR)
4) No friendly fire, (careful with that grenade. don't worry its aoe.)
3)Animals that drop gold
2)gnomes
1)other players: /1: were can i find teh blue seeds?
/1: in yur mom
/1 :lol
/1:Kekekeke
I didn't read through the entire comments, so I don't know if someone posted this, but to the people saying that most game developers are men in response to the Guild Wars inspired #2, it was the female developers who designed it.
I never minded it, but that's because I probably approach MMO's, especially Guild Wars, from a different view. Immersion takes a backseat or supplementary role to fun and what something looks like. I mean, if it's cool and fits the world, then awesome. If it's cool and doesn't fit, it's whatever- It still looks cool!
And I mean, really, if you can deal with the completely immersion shattering ability for players to just disappear to anywhere they want in the game in the blink of an eye, then in what attire players carry themselves into battle with can't be too bad. I deal with the map travel thing because it lets me play with my friends and get into the action sooner.
Guess it's just differences in fun priorities? -shrug-
I'm guilty of rushing everywhere and riding my mount into whatever building will have me unless it's crowded, in which case I'll be polite and dismount.
I hate high heels in an MMO. Sometimes it's okay on casters, but on warriors and rogues, no. Twisting and ankle right when you were going in for the kill is not sexy or cute.
Yes, I know it's not supposed to be realistic, I know I'm quibbling over footwear in games where my character can run around on the ceiling, fly, or shoot fire out of her hands, but it doesn't matter. High heels bother me.
I can tolerate some skin or otherwise feminine clothing, but even my DCUO female character in the mini skirt is wearing flat heeled boots.
But the biggest immersion breaker for me so far has always been VOIP. I avoid it whenever it's practical because I cannot concentrate on enjoying game play while in voice chat with other people. The only time I find it useful is in pvp, since I don't care for raiding.
I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate these grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist economy, accompanied by an educational system which would be oriented toward social goals.
~Albert Einstein
I have always hated the oversized weapons. I've always preferred realistic, even if ornate, weapons in mmos.
I don't have any problem with any of the things mentioned in the article.
By far the most non-immersive thing any mmorpg can have is an arcade-style resurrection system. If you're not afraid of dying, you're not roleplaying.
You guys are completely missing one huge point. Each game/movie/book has a tone and setting that varies in its realism or fantacism. Each world establishes its own set of rules. Immersion breaks when the game throws in a scene, character, or event that is inconsistent with the rest of the game's tone.
Now it may be so that individuals vary in their preference for realism or the fantastic; and it may be so that such intensely polarized individuals find it impossible to become immersed when one game caters too strongly to the opposite end of the spectrum. And that's fine. Such is the nature of personal preferences. But for those who aren't so polarized that they simply cannot get immersed in games that lean heavily in one direction or the other, the primary factor that disrupts immersion (as far as these categories of realism versus fantacism are concerned) is not that the game is too realistic or fantastic, but rather that the game is not consistently realistic or fantastic in tone. Imagine a light-hearted "Harry Potter" moment being tossed in the middle of a vulgar, sexually explicit scene of "A Song of Ice and Fire," or even worse, imagine the reverse! Both stories and styles are capable of being plenty immersive in their own right, but if either wavers in their tone and style, they risk breaking the reader/viewer's immersion.
A game can be ridiculously fantastical. As long as it remains consistently fantastical, players can remain immersed. WoW, for example, strikes me as being consistently whimsical and "cartoony" (as it is often described) in its overall aesthetic approach and story. The same thing goes for a game grounded in strict realism. As long as, say, a Disney faerie doesn't emerge from a knight's helm in a dark medeival setting, players should be able to remain immersed.
I agree on all points, bugs me just as it does you. Also bugs me that I keep hearing the 'guys all want the women in thier games (un)Dressed this way. Im a male whos very intrested in the female body(Looking
) but It bugs me when some chickie in high heels and about as much coverage as I have on my left hand, has the same defensive ability as the full head-to-toe steel fullplate I've got on.
Sure let us strip down and show off, but in combat I much prefer 'real' looking gear. (Another thing bugs me is the 'chest slider' idea where ALL women seem to have 15 lb sacks tied to thier chest, its unrelistic and, imo, not attractive.)
If a game caters those who love half naked women or ridiculously huge weapons, I don't really mind.
Just let them make it optional and don't make the best armour look like bikinis or the best weapons look ridiculously unrealistic so you're more or less forced into that specific look and feel. Let the game offer choice so it caters all kinds of people. Roleplaying guilds or those who like realism may find themselves at home and make themselves stand out by a specific style, as well as all the others like manga lovers - or wow style/size shoulderpads fetisjists. :-)
Why not have and/and instead of or/or? I think game developers systematically underestimate the effect of the customisation choices their game has to offer. To be able to make a character look and wear whatever you fancy wearing him/her is very important for the immersion of a significant part of their potential playerbase.
That's what I think guildwars partially succeeded in doing, by making looks independent from stats. It was just the female elementalists that really had very little choice, and yes, mesmers still couldn't do without heels either. And so on, it still was quite limited. I hope GW2 won't make that mistake and make the variety far bigger.
As for a living, breating, realistic world it would indeed be nice if a fantasy world would feel like it.
Cast your vote: The importance of character customisation
I'm not talking about the setting.
I'm talking about the deeper underlying realism.
Concepts in fantasy need to have a realistic link. We need to have something somewhere in actual reality that it links to.
Dragons for example do not exist. However they do have scales, which do exist. They have wings, which do exist. They breathe fire, which does exist. etc.
A dragon is nothing more then an unrealistic mix of completely realistical concepts. Everything in fantasy is an unrealistic mix of realistic concepts. Because if it doesn't have a base in reality then our brains are simply incapable of comprehending it.
Even the most fantastical concepts can be broken down into an unrealistic mix of realistic concepts.
Furthermore there are various primal concepts that we simply expect and if they're not there then the game will feel wrong. Just look at things like animations, we expect things to move a certain way; based on reality. If they don't move that way then they just feel horribly wrong. We expect things to have momentum as they do in reality. We expect sound to work as it does in reality. etc.
All these things that lie at the basis of our own reality are just as vital in even the most fantastical worlds.
No setting, no matter how fantastical, becomes better by changing or even removing how these basic concepts work. Making sounds equally loud no matter the distance doesn't improve any setting. Removing all sense of momentum from every animation doesn't improve any setting. Introducing fantastical objects without providing any realistical frame of reference to describe them doesn't improve any setting.
We are the bunny.
Resistance is futile.
''/\/\'''''/\/\''''''/\/\
( o.o) ( o.o) ( o.o)
(")("),,(")("),(")(")
I'm on fire, and water doesn't put me out.
'nuff said
Loading screens between zones.
Instances
Invisible walls
Bunny hopping.
Endless swim.
Nothing says irony like spelling ideot wrong.
(stares blankly drooling at the pic above) yep, that's whatever you were talking about for you....