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Sandbox Endgaming
LEmmopeasant
Member Posts: 46
In a sandbox MMO that doesn't have the building of custom content, where does the conflict come from? In Themeparks it's easy. The conflict is already there, go do the PvE. Explore it all, max out, do it all, then do it again til you don't want to anymore.
In no-building-sandbox, what's the conflict? Fight over wealth, power? In MMOs $$$ just lets you do things, makes them easier, or it gives you more power through better gear/whatever. What's the point in getting the power? Like having the most powerful character or biggest, most powerful guild? What do you do with it?
Try to keep it, hoard it away, and see how long you can be #1? See how big you can make your pile of $$$?
Make mischief and PK everybody?
Do the opposite, stop troublemakers?
Govern the world?
Make up your own stuff to do? Like player-made-quests?
It's like... how can that sandbox endgame be expanded on? So you don't get stuck with, "OK, What now?" In real life, we work hard and play hard to make our lives better. But in an MMO world, your character can sit in one spot for 100 years it makes no difference to them. They can't TRULY enjoy partying, getting a massage, or eating expensive, fancy foods. So being rich doesn't mean anything except for power.
In Entropia Universe, you can legally exchange in game currency for US dollars. So wealth in that MMO means real life $$$. Then the game becomes something like an online casino. Is that a good thing? Does that expand on the endgame? Because then your progress translates into a reward you can take with you away from the computer. YOU can go get a massage with all the gold you looted off those mobs.
So is there anyway to expand/elaborate on sandbox endgame without introducing player-made-content or turning it into a casino with real life $ rewards?
(Btw, I know I've ignored social aspects of MMORPGing in this post. That's because, for this question, I'm only interested in something quantifiable. I want to explore possibilities of sandboxing without saying "Oh, just socialize, chill out, have fun, roleplay, use your imagination.")
Comments
My favorite part of your thread was the part of your thread where you answered the question you posed in your thread.
/Thread.
I hate the word endgame.
Its either game over or continue.
If it's not broken, you are not innovating.
You'd make a great designer.
I guess I used "endgame" for familiarity. So.... How could you make it continue? Make the game over come later, at least.
surely sandbox endgame is the point you grow bored of doing whatever it is you are doing. Or maybe another game catches your eye that you think you might enjoy even more so you change games. There that's endgame for you for the sandbox you are playing currently. Never really THOUGHT about endgame in a sandbox, what's the point? There is no win or lose.
the poster formerly known as melangel :P
Sort of. I'm using the term as the point where you can no longer advance your character, and any further increase of your wealth, guild size would just be obscene. Or if you don't care about accumulating wealth, the point where you've met your character advancement goals. Something like that.
I always think about endgame in a sandbox. But anyway.... I guess I'm really asking... how can you create conflict in a sandbox that isn't based on fighting-over-wealth or mischief-for-mischief's-sake? Without turning it into a themepark. Without player made content.
a pvp centric sandbox? Fight over resources? Fight to maintain your player built villages? If you lose, you have to found another and the victor gets the spoils of war. For victories sake I suppose or for the spoils or maybe the area they just aquired is very useful for other aspects of some game element. I don't know, kind of a blank slate to go on here. No idea what's available in this sandbox
I give the above examples because these can be ever changing, ever evolving situations that affect the game world or an area of the game world.
the poster formerly known as melangel :P
I'll take that as a compliment. You basically asked a question about "things to do" in a sandbox after you'd progressed your character to a point of diminishing returns on their effectiveness, then proceeded to answer your own question with a laundry list of things to do.
Am I missing something?
Doesn't seem like you grasp the idea of a sandbox. It's never been about maxing out your character, it's about the overlooming narative of the game. This is written by the actions other people in the game are making. That's the point of a sandbox, the interactions between players. It's not about maxing out your character.
Is there an endgame to RL?
Likewise there is no endgame in a Sandbox game, it is open ended gameplay.
The best way to understand it is to experience it.
Order of the Silver Star, OSS
ESKA, Playing MMORPG's since Ultima Online 1997 - Order of the Silver Serpent, Atlantic Shard
Shaydryn and Helthros pretty much covered it.
Since you dismiss the value of the creative content of a sandbox MMO - player generated content and social interaction - and focus primarily on what to do after you've levelled, I'm inclined to say that sandbox gameplay is neither what you are describing nor what you are interested in.
There isn't a "right" or "wrong" way to play, if you want to use a screwdriver to put nails into wood, have at it, simply don't complain when the guy next to you with the hammer is doing it much better and easier. - Allein
"Graphics are often supplied by Engines that (some) MMORPG's are built in" - Spuffyre
Those are good examples of sandbox play, but still all of them are based around fighting over wealth/power. Is there any other way to create conflict?
Well, the "laundry list" of things to do are either the same as playermade quests. Like you do them just to do them because there's nothing else to do. Or it's only more fighting over wealth/power. I want to know if after you've become the richest, best player, there's anything else you could do that you didn't come up with yourself. Besides defend your riches.
I grasp the idea of a sandbox. Of course it's not strictly about advancing your character. I'm posing a question to explore new possibilities. Maybe the answser is: No, there's no source of conflict other than struggle for power, and beyond that, people have to make up their own activities. I understand that what I highlighted is why it's called a sandbox. I'm just wondering if there can be more to it as well. I couldn't come up with anything myself, so I posted it.
I'm almost regretting using the term endgame... I suppose I used it because I don't want any answers related to character/guild progression. For this thread, I have no interest in hearing about grand schemes of character development, gear, experience, or anything like that.
And btw, I have experienced it.
Why do you say I dismiss the value of player generated content and social interaction? I dismissed them as answers to my question, yes, but I did that because we all already know about them. I'm wondering if there's anything more.
Well...for me it was eve and darkfall...mostly eve , over 5 years
And...how should i put it..watching game of thrones? That was the "feel" of eve for me . Corporations (clans) , alliances (great houses) , and a neverending struggle for domination and power between alliances
It`s hardly ever about how maxed up your character is , it`s a lot more about very large groups having very large conflicts both in numbers and over a very long time . There have been 3000 players in a fight , and alliances fought wars for months , even years
throw in a copious ammount of politics , treason , and so on...and in my oppinion you have an overwhelmingly engrosing game where the lore is actual lore generated ingame by players , and the "end bosses" are not 1 creature vs your 10 players , but rather alliances of thousands
tl;dr : your ussual themepark raid boss is in ve (sandbox) a corporation or an entire alliance , and conflicts are not 30 minutes 10 man battlegrounds (or 100, whatever) with no effect on anything at all in game , but rather months long affairs involving everything from industry to "programs" to bolster your alliance`s morale
What could be added to EVE that doesn't involve the neverending struggle for domination and power between alliances that would make it an even greater MMO? That's the question I'm asking.
If I were playing a "sandbox" MMORPG, I'd want it to have multiple options for highly skilled users.
Random Generated Raids by NPC Hordes:
Similar to DAoC's PvE-servers and RIFT's invasions, have masses of game-generated NPC antagonists spawn in raid formations, and attack nearby cities and townships. Make these invasions lucrative, so that participants are rewarded for participating with rare weapons, armor, and other goods worthy of long-term usage.
High-Difficulty Zones with Lairs and Random "Elite" Creature Packs:
For those that played DAoC, there were high-level zones in each realm for PvE players. I played Albion in DAoC, so our zone was Dartmoor. The random elite creatures roaming the zone were challenging, and they dropped rare weapons and armor at least 90% of the time, usually with some fun particle effects emitting from them. This was a boon for crafters, because they could salvage these items for incredibly valuable and rare materials.
Remote Zones for Gathering Rare/Precious Resources for Various Crafting Professions:
Part of what I loved about the Ultima series, both in its single-player AND multiplayer incarnations, were the rare resources that you could only gather in certain areas, and at specific times. We've seen something similar to this in other MMOs, but the execution is usually poor, and the areas are usually overrun by gold farmers.
It would be desirable to make these areas exceptionally challenging, exceptionally rewarding, and accessible only to those that fight off the random creatures guarding those resources. In other words, the resource nodes should be directly linked to the creatures guarding them, and they should only be made available to the player that "tapped" the creatures, thus avoiding potential "ninjas".
It could be in the form of resource stations like ore mines, lumber mills, "abandoned" farms, strange pools of water, menacing schools of fish, etc. Each resource station could spawn one or more waves of creatures, and depending on the number of waves, the difficulty of the creatures, and the user's skill level, the resources yielded could range from mediocre to exceptional. A good example of these types of resource stations might be RIFT's crafting rifts, or resources similar to some of the more popular RTS games.
Advanced Player-Made/Tamed Transportation:
The types of transportation required would depend on the types of geographical variance the game offers. If there are floating islands in the sky, remote islands far out at sea, caves off-set high on a mountain peak, or all of the above. New tiers of in-game transportation could address each of these challenges in order of difficulty, starting with something easy like riding a horse, and advancing to sea-bound trading ships and airships for those skyward destinations.
Perhaps there can be tamable mounts (ala UO), with various mounts capable of traveling in different environmental climes, with corresponding resistances, such as a lava lizard that can walk across fire and molten eart, able to venture deep into the core of the world.
Advanced Personal Housing Options:
Players can start with basic cabins, huts, large tents, or some other simplified form of lodging, but as the player progresses in skill levels and/or gains wealth, they can construct, or have constructed, larger more grandiose lodgings such as castles, forts, and small villages with their own guards, crafting/trading stations, etc.
Community-Developed Townships/Cities:
Like-minded players can team up to form villages or cities beyond the pre-established townships and fortresses already offered in the game. They can start shops, crafting stations, stables, armories, magic schools, etc. As these townships evolve, they can become more fortified against attack, spawn stronger guards, and offer more resources, such as airship landings and portals to other dimensions (for expanded game worlds).
Game Master/Developer-Generated Seasonal (real-life and in-game season) Events:
Throughout the calendar year, and maybe even the in-game calendar year, if it differs greatly (depending on the game design), there can be pre-scheduled events that offer new challenges, season-related rewards, and perks for those that take participation to new levels, such as townships that thoroughly decorate their streets with seasonal decor, and come up with their own original ways to celebrate the event.
These are just a few ideas. Almost none of them are new, but some of them are fondly remembered features from other MMORPGs, some "sandbox", some not.
I think there are a lot of ideas that a good "sandbox" MMORPG could borrow from other games, and still be highly favored by the gaming community.
well...i`m not sure how to answer that...you want me to talk about the PvE part? they are allways upgrading this and that , that mission(quest), that loot , that ...whatever i never really payd much attention to that sort of stuff...NPC`s are NPC`s and that`s the end of it, imho building better npc`s and quests and "bosses" in eve is a waste of time . Killing NPC`s is for single player games , in mmo`s (for me) it`s just a tool to spawn cash
what is there left then? building structures? that`s all about pvp too...industry(crafting)? that`s all about pvp too....
what could be added? on a conceptual level , i dont really know . I like it the way it is and i dont care at all about anything that has me interacting with a NPC in a mmo game
on a tehnical level? i`d need a week to list all the stuff like "that weapon does 5% more damage then it should and breaks ballance!"..and lag
Then the game becomes something like an online casino. Is that a good thing? Does that expand on the endgame? Because then your progress translates into a reward you can take with you away from the computer.
Then life and death is a good reason to keep playing but that would perhaps require permadeath and quite frankly that could get boring with nothing else. To live for the sake of living and no other reason? Not so sure. Assuming you are still wanting a pvp centric game. Other then that I cannot think of anything except politics, which isn't always about personal power, it reflects on everyday life, ideals, goals as a society and so on.
the poster formerly known as melangel :P
EVE has, or has had, all of these.
Give me liberty or give me lasers
More cooperative PvE content that is cut off from PvP.
As long as EVE allows PvP to happen everywhere, it will be limited to 'the neverending struggle for domination and power'. People who just want to create stuff are not going to be inclined to play a game where all you accomplished can be destroyed by someone who is merely better at PvP combat.
EVE could add features where you can build entire civilizations in space but there is little point where this will just be ground down to nothing by bored PvPers.
Your question, and whole thread, makes no sense. There is no endgame in sandbox as there is no linearity - start -> end route.
Maybe rephrase your post to better clarify your point?
In practical terms I view a game's 'endgame' as the aspect of the game that the devs promote over any others once a game has matured. It is the are of the game that the devs want to funnel the players into due to 'vision' or simply because it is the most cost-efficient area to develop content for.
For WoW the raids are the endgame that's the only real area that Blizzard develops stuff for after an expansion has come out. For pre-NGE SWG the endgame was supposed to be the Galactic Civil War but got switched over to the Jedi holo grind. For A Tale in the Desert the endgame is completing the tests once the population is done researching the technologies. For EVE the endgame for most of its history was the 0.0 wars but lately it has been diversifing into wormholes and faction PvP.