Everything in that vid is either player-crafted, some kind of reward, or gotten from a mob. Then placed, by hand, using an amazing system to put anything, anywhere.
Even the feel of that video is incredible... Such a bummer... Some day! Someone will deliver a new fantastically immersive game for many to enjoy, and it will include housing like this.
Even though it was instanced, i absolutely loved housing in FFXI. I don't understand why something to that level hasn't been done again in every new MMO. Instead of sticking a warehouse NPC in town, all that should be handled inside your own personal house. Being able to collect items such as banners or furniture from crafting to increase your vault space is amazing fun. It just adds more "stuff" to do that isn't combat related and i believe that's important for longevity.
Loved it in UO, loved it in FFXI, was somewhat turned off by it in DAoC only because the further plots took forever to reach by slow ass horse (and I missed the intial wave of plots close to the zoneline), and Heaven only knows I've asked for it in the suggestion forums of every MMO I've tried/played for any decent length of time.
Blizzard's WoW devs were just a bunch of pricks about it, and it never sat right with me that they flat out refused to implement it after teasing people with rumors of guild halls for years.
I'm looking forward to seeing what RIFT does with their system. If it's anything like the suggestions I dropped in the forums a while back, I'm going to be one happy camper.
With a recall system like UOs, this wouldn't be an issue.... Soon I hope.
Loved it in UO, loved it in FFXI, was somewhat turned off by it in DAoC only because the further plots took forever to reach by slow ass horse (and I missed the intial wave of plots close to the zoneline), and Heaven only knows I've asked for it in the suggestion forums of every MMO I've tried/played for any decent length of time.
Blizzard's WoW devs were just a bunch of pricks about it, and it never sat right with me that they flat out refused to implement it after teasing people with rumors of guild halls for years.
I'm looking forward to seeing what RIFT does with their system. If it's anything like the suggestions I dropped in the forums a while back, I'm going to be one happy camper.
I forgot about the guild halls, unreal, they did didn't they? I remember everyone looking forward to that... I also remember beta testing WoW and thinking, "They have everything they need to make guild housing, and more... they can do anything with this.. If they wanted to."
And now, honestly, there is no excuse... $60 million a month for how many years? No excuse.
Btw, I enjoyed WoW for a long time and I still go back and play it every now and then, even though it's not even close to being my favorite game, but it has its entertaining moments.
Heh , since when did housing become important? Let the Devs start creating a game where a casual player doesn't reach end game inside of a month. Once that's settled out , then work on garbage features to attract some koreans, like housing.
Psh, regardless of how long it takes to get to endgame, at some point people are going to tire of rehashing that last bit of content. Housing was, in games that did it *right*, incentive to keep playing in order to collect and show off basically *anything* as a trophy. As stated earlier, it's kept people subbed way longer than the games rightfully should have.
I don't expect anyone who never played UO or SWG to understand it, because you're on the outside looking in. We been there, done that, and it stuck.
UO was a unique experience in that before the chinese gold farmers, people would place a house and sell it on ebay. There was really no rule against selling items, and it was crazy to see people pay $$$ for a virtual house. When Trammel hit, people would sit on decaying houses for hours hoping to be the one to pop a new one.
I am glad Rift is bringing a form of housing, can't wait to see what the slivers look like.
Loved it in UO, loved it in FFXI, was somewhat turned off by it in DAoC only because the further plots took forever to reach by slow ass horse (and I missed the intial wave of plots close to the zoneline), and Heaven only knows I've asked for it in the suggestion forums of every MMO I've tried/played for any decent length of time.
Blizzard's WoW devs were just a bunch of pricks about it, and it never sat right with me that they flat out refused to implement it after teasing people with rumors of guild halls for years.
I'm looking forward to seeing what RIFT does with their system. If it's anything like the suggestions I dropped in the forums a while back, I'm going to be one happy camper.
I forgot about the guild halls, unreal, they did didn't they? I remember everyone looking forward to that... I also remember beta testing WoW and thinking, "They have everything they need to make guild housing, and more... they can do anything with this.. If they wanted to."
And now, honestly, there is no excuse... $60 million a month for how many years? No excuse.
Btw, I enjoyed WoW for a long time and I still go back and play it every now and then, even though it's not even close to being my favorite game, but it has its entertaining moments.
Yeah, I definitely got several years of enjoyment out of WoW. Sure, I'm one of those bastards that spews vitriolic comments about "WoW clones", but that's because I expect a different experience if I'm going to spend money on another game to step away from WoW, not engage in content that feels like the game I just left-- but to your other point, yes, they teased us a while back, and I remember my guild freaking out about it, we were all very excited when rumors bubbled out out of the ether. Then... nothing.
Being one of the biggest money makers on the block, there really just wasn't any excuse for them to repeatedly refuse to implement these things. Between this and their refusal to implement armor dyes despite repeated requests by players on their official forums (numerous threads of players comparing themselves to "rodeo clowns"), I had to wonder what in the Hell they were thinking. Especially when you take into consideration that just about every other MMO offers at least one option for armor dyes and/or cosmetic changes to your armor.
Heh , since when did housing become important? Let the Devs start creating a game where a casual player doesn't reach end game inside of a month. Once that's settled out , then work on garbage features to attract some koreans, like housing.
Psh, regardless of how long it takes to get to endgame, at some point people are going to tire of rehashing that last bit of content. Housing was, in games that did it *right*, incentive to keep playing in order to collect and show off basically *anything* as a trophy. As stated earlier, it's kept people subbed way longer than the games rightfully should have.
I don't expect anyone who never played UO or SWG to understand it, because you're on the outside looking in. We been there, done that, and it stuck.
UO was a unique experience in that before the chinese gold farmers, people would place a house and sell it on ebay. There was really no rule against selling items, and it was crazy to see people pay $$$ for a virtual house. When Trammel hit, people would sit on decaying houses for hours hoping to be the one to pop a new one.
I am glad Rift is bringing a form of housing, can't wait to see what the slivers look like.
I wonder if UO is making more money than SWTOR right now lol! Up until SWTOR I believe they were... Still going... housing is part of that obviously, last time I logged onto the official game servers I saw nobody for a week straight.
It amazes me EA hasn't taken the lead on innovation, but I get the perspective it's just sad.
Player Housing IS possible. It just is not a priority. If people do not like the game or if they do not find the game fun, they will not build a house.
The reasons make sense though. You could create the best housing feature-set we have ever seen in a game but if nobody enjoys the game to that point, they will not stick around just to have a cool house.?
Seem as if developers now days see no importance in this feature known as player housing. The quote has a point. If Developers put too much resources into Housing over other features, than players may not be interested in the game and wont build houses regardless of how detailed that feature is.
but why has this feature been tossed under the bus over the last few years? seem like this feature has become very unpopular in the developers offices lately.
Player Housing seem like a dynamic feature that gives players something to do when raiding/leveling/other grinds come to a end. Seem like a win win feature from a consumer point of view, but not from a developer.
What turn of events causes this?
Simple, Housing used to be more widespread when online rpg's had more sandbox features. There is no ability to add areas to the current theme park style of gaming that has taken over the jondra, the code simply isn't there nor will the engines they use support it.
Once developers saw millions of people bum rush warcraft, sandbox style gameplay became almost subservient to the money the themeparks make.
When you plopped down a house in SWG, you litterly had a graphic interface to alter the game itself, anymore the only ones even messing with sandboxes are the indie developers with low enough overhead to attempt it.
Hope this helps, ignore the goofballs who tell you it was a niche, it used to be a benchmark.
This is one of the more "telling" and "spot on" comments I have seen regarding MMOs here,there or anywhere.
I do not care what anyone says WoW changed everything in MMOs. The how and why they changed is simple: Before WoW, all MMOs were "niche". It isnt that they had a new way to contact and pitch to a new playerbase, they actually "farmed" up a totaly new playerbase.
In a themepark design, it is unnatural to anchor a player to one place with a home when the rest of your design is focused on moving them on a constant zone-to-zone path. Similarly, when the general tendency is to on-demand instancing, the concept of player-created landmarks is a little hard to mix in naturally.
I agree with this as a big reason why player housing is no longer considered in an MMO.
I think the point in history when player housing was dropped from MMO development was when WoW was released without player housing. This "proved" that player housing is not necessary to have an immensely successful game.
When I think of a metaphor for this interpretation of player housing, I imagine a fast food restaurant coming up with a hamburger that is the best selilng hamburger for years, but it doesn't have any mustard on it. And so every restaurant chain from this point forward is reluctant to ever put mustard on any of their burgers, because you don't need mustard if you want to make big money selling burgers.
Because nobody, except the owner, cares about other people's virtual house.
Even though you worded your argument completely wrong, I'm going to assume you mean that people only care about their own homes.
Putting whether or not thats true completely aside - why is that a bad thing? If players have something that they care about for their character / in the world, its irrelevant whether or not other people care about it. It gives players enjoyment and attatchment, I cant see how that could possibly be a bad thing. Its like vanity pets, or customising your armor/appearance, or dozens of other features and elements to the game that only you care about your own personal things - which is completely understandable - but that doesnt, in the least, make them bad.
Haha yes, sorry I'm not native english
Where it's a bad thing ? It's a solo-only feature that consumes some vital space in a group-oriented genre.
It's like requesting an Angry Bird minigame in WoW : It can be done, and some people will enjoy it, but it's not a priority at all.
***** Before hitting that reply button, please READ the WHOLE thread you're about to post in *****
Where it's a bad thing ? It's a solo-only feature that consumes some vital space in a group-oriented genre.
Why is it solo only? In SWG, I shared a house with another player. We had a large house on Naboo and lived near a player city which, since it took a gorup of players to build, was also not solo. My structures were almost always open to the public so people wandering the wilds could walk in, use the vendors, check out the decoration, etc. As a merchant, I set up some good relationships with repeat customers that way.
Now, I could certainly make structures private, and in the case of my "crafting workshop" house, I did. But, the option for it to be solo and the mandate that it is solo are two different things. Thats like me choosing to quest solo or grouping up with a buddy to do quests. Really, housing can be a social tool just like anything else, but, as many have stated, it needs to be designed with such goals in mind
edit: saw you added "It's like requesting an Angry Bird minigame in WoW : It can be done, and some people will enjoy it, but it's not a priority at all." and couldn't resist.
Angry Birds might not make it, but plenty of room for Plants vs Zombies eh? (http://youtu.be/aWI5XTmGrmo long video, but you get the point)
-mklinic
"Do something right, no one remembers. Do something wrong, no one forgets" -from No One Remembers by In Strict Confidence
It isnt that they had a new way to contact and pitch to a new playerbase, they actually "farmed" up a totaly new playerbase.
Something that every other company in the industy wishes they could manage one tenth as well. Yas indeed.
But most of the worst social fallout effect lies in what it's done to player's expectations.
"Before WoW, all MMOs were "niche"."--and before WoW, 250k was plenty of subs. Now its considered a failure, not worth anyone's time to even try.
We don't expect a feature list similar to WoW's opening day, we expect a feature list of a WoW-right-now mature game. Several times larger game, bug free, orders of magnitude more polished, and for the same cost. Anything less, failure.
And of course, we expect our new games to contain every feature we've ever dreamed of, or some other game fifteen years ago had once.
Self-pity imprisons us in the walls of our own self-absorption. The whole world shrinks down to the size of our problem, and the more we dwell on it, the smaller we are and the larger the problem seems to grow.
Player Housing IS possible. It just is not a priority. If people do not like the game or if they do not find the game fun, they will not build a house.
The reasons make sense though. You could create the best housing feature-set we have ever seen in a game but if nobody enjoys the game to that point, they will not stick around just to have a cool house.?
Seem as if developers now days see no importance in this feature known as player housing. The quote has a point. If Developers put too much resources into Housing over other features, than players may not be interested in the game and wont build houses regardless of how detailed that feature is.
but why has this feature been tossed under the bus over the last few years? seem like this feature has become very unpopular in the developers offices lately.
Player Housing seem like a dynamic feature that gives players something to do when raiding/leveling/other grinds come to a end. Seem like a win win feature from a consumer point of view, but not from a developer.
What turn of events causes this?
in case nobody has pointed it out yet. My response to the developer is this:
'why not take combat out of the game, I mean if the people like the game enough they will not be worried about combat'
depending on the game focus and depending on how good housing is, housing can easily not be 'fluff' to a game. Although the Sims is not an MMO, if it were I am going to go out on a limb and say that housing would be pretty important to the game.
what devs are doing (on purpose I might add) is narrowing the parameters of what is considered an MMO feature. If they could reduce the parameters of what is a feature list for a standard MMO to 'Street Fighter' I assure you they would.
Please do not respond to me, even if I ask you a question, its rhetorical.
Cause it is hard to do right, costs money and is seemingly only wanted by a minority of players. So even if a dev had plans to include it, it gets cut by the investors pretty quick.
Originally posted by MMOExposed Player Housing IS possible. It just is not a priority. If people do not like the game or if they do not find the game fun, they will not build a house. The reasons make sense though. You could create the best housing feature-set we have ever seen in a game but if nobody enjoys the game to that point, they will not stick around just to have a cool house.?
Seem as if developers now days see no importance in this feature known as player housing. The quote has a point. If Developers put too much resources into Housing over other features, than players may not be interested in the game and wont build houses regardless of how detailed that feature is.but why has this feature been tossed under the bus over the last few years?seem like this feature has become very unpopular in the developers offices lately.Player Housing seem like a dynamic feature that gives players something to do when raiding/leveling/other grinds come to a end. Seem like a win win feature from a consumer point of view, but not from a developer.What turn of events causes this?
Without reading the other replies, here is my take on it. Players play today's games for what, 3-6 months and then leave? Think of all the abandoned houses! Games today have no sense of permanency.
Even the quotes say it all. On one hand, they admit that players are not enjoying their games, for any extended period of time, that is. On the other hand, they use the former as an excuse to not even look at player housing.
To me, this part of the first quote said it all: If people do not like the game or if they do not find the game fun, they will not build a house. Maybe, I don't know... Build a FUN game?
- Al
Personally the only modern MMORPG trend that annoys me is the idea that MMOs need to be designed in a way to attract people who don't actually like MMOs. Which to me makes about as much sense as someone trying to figure out a way to get vegetarians to eat at their steakhouse. - FARGIN_WAR
Cause it is hard to do right, costs money and is seemingly only wanted by a minority of players. So even if a dev had plans to include it, it gets cut by the investors pretty quick.
I personally dont care much for housing but I will say this, in my experience I have found most players actually do want housing. Now naturally I play specific MMOs and my experience doesnt represent all gamers but I think its safe to say that a lot of gamers like housing and more specifically good housing.
If you offer a door and one light and call it housing there is a high likely hood that its going to appear that players dont like housing.
On the other hand if your housing rocks...guess what
Please do not respond to me, even if I ask you a question, its rhetorical.
My point was you have to start somewhere. Can you tell me the last game that failed due to having housing? Is there a new game that has even tried housing from the begining? It seems to me like there is a preconceptiuon that it would fail. Im not really sure why that is. You could have a themepark game with meaningful housing. It could still have all of those money making gear grinding features. I really don't believe starting with housing that isnt complex and then building to that in future patches and expansion would break the bank during development.
Can you tell me the last game that succeeded because it had housing? It's a feature that really means nothing to the overall success or failure of the game Yes, for those people who want it, it's a nice add-on, but it doesn't make or break a game for anyone. At worst, it causes visual blight and needs to be controlled. At best, at least in most games, it's a wholly solo activity that takes people out of the game world and out of the game activity entirely while it's going on. It's like having a place to go where you can watch streaming TV in an MMO. It defeats the purpose of playing the game in the first place.
I don't think having minimal housing and adding to it will make a lot of people happy either, they think the entire game needs to revolve around housing, it needs to be a primary social driver in the game.
This is a feature that if you hated it you wouldn't even have to bother with it. It would not have any adverse effect on you at all. You could still get on that gear grind hamster wheel and play the game you want while other people who enjoy it could play the game they want. i dont see how this is a negative thing at all.
It still costs money and time, two things that are in very short supply in a development cycle. Unless you can show how it will directly improve the bottom line of a game, why should a developer bother with it? Your enjoyment is not the primary reason these games are made, your money is.
Hell I can't stand it but the point was removing housing did nothing to stop it. In fact now it is a constant in your face type of thing. I'd rather have it locked away in their house where I don't have to see it all of the time.
I didn't say it stopped it, I said I see no point in having any activity which promotes it and player housing is, primarily, just a dickwaving exercise as currently implemented. Come up with a better implementation and maybe there will be more support.
Can you tell me the last game that succeeded because it had housing? It's a feature that really means nothing to the overall success or failure of the game
The Sims.
look, in the gaming industry what they have actually tired to do with any level of intresting complexity is crazy, ridiculously, insanity small. I cant believe that the main thing 'gaming technology' can provide is combat with trolls.
Just because it hasnt been done with any level of seriousness doesnt mean people wouldnt like it.
Please do not respond to me, even if I ask you a question, its rhetorical.
look, in the gaming industry what they have actually tired to do with any level of intresting complexity is crazy, ridiculously, insanity small. I cant believe that the main thing 'gaming technology' can provide is combat with trolls.
Just because it hasnt been done with any level of seriousness doesnt mean people wouldnt like it.
Whether people would like it or not is irrelevant. What matters is, would enough people pay for it who wouldn't otherwise play the game anyhow. I get so tired of people acting like making you happy is the goal of developers. Their goal is to make more money. If having player housing isn't going to get an additional 10,000 people subscribing to their game, why should they bother?
Player Housing IS possible. It just is not a priority. If people do not like the game or if they do not find the game fun, they will not build a house.
The reasons make sense though. You could create the best housing feature-set we have ever seen in a game but if nobody enjoys the game to that point, they will not stick around just to have a cool house.?
Seem as if developers now days see no importance in this feature known as player housing. The quote has a point. If Developers put too much resources into Housing over other features, than players may not be interested in the game and wont build houses regardless of how detailed that feature is.
but why has this feature been tossed under the bus over the last few years? seem like this feature has become very unpopular in the developers offices lately.
Player Housing seem like a dynamic feature that gives players something to do when raiding/leveling/other grinds come to a end. Seem like a win win feature from a consumer point of view, but not from a developer.
What turn of events causes this?
The reason that this has dissapeared is because most game do not have the key elements to drive housing and these are; Longevity/community people just dont play long enogh to care or need a place to show off trophies or their taste in decoration.
Most games at the moment are lazily designed worlds; Combat and endgame in a month yet again lazy design.
With a real MMO where ; Longevity is real (i.e. 2 years gameplay to max level....) and community can form in a real world where the players are playing against the Lore of the world not just trying their epeen out against another guild without a care for the world.
Hopefully we will see a few more MMORPGs released that contain a real charachter buuilding rqt some roleplay , economy and politics all world based.
PvP and twitch based games are not MMOs in a truer sense all you need to prove this is a "X by Y arena" , Auto features that remove gameplay that a real MMO requires need to be removed .. Mail, Insta Travel , Global Auction Houses.
Dont get me wrong ; I can support sandbox worlds with potential MO and Darkfall if you want PvP and an open world but then again I am still convinced Darkfall would sell better with more dungeons / landmass and the PvP removed.
In summary the depth doesnt exist in most games to even warrant Housing as you just wont play the game for long enough for it to matter.
________________________________________________________ Sorcery must persist, the future is the Citadel
look, in the gaming industry what they have actually tired to do with any level of intresting complexity is crazy, ridiculously, insanity small. I cant believe that the main thing 'gaming technology' can provide is combat with trolls.
Just because it hasnt been done with any level of seriousness doesnt mean people wouldnt like it.
Whether people would like it or not is irrelevant. What matters is, would enough people pay for it who wouldn't otherwise play the game anyhow. I get so tired of people acting like making you happy is the goal of developers. Their goal is to make more money. If having player housing isn't going to get an additional 10,000 people subscribing to their game, why should they bother?
And don't say you'll be happy. Nobody cares.
1. not to split hairs but you did say 'game' not MMO. That said, throwing in the best selling single player game in gaming history as evidence DOES hold water regardless of if someone doesnt want to agree with it.
2. of course people will pay for it, that is implied. Like I said the VAST majority of what can be done in this technology is not being done so there really dosent exist any baseline to proove other than not being moronic. killing trolls all day is not the only thing people are willing to pay money for and I am willing to bet people would pay money for a game that contains a series of features EXCEPT killing trolls.
Please do not respond to me, even if I ask you a question, its rhetorical.
Player Housing IS possible. It just is not a priority. If people do not like the game or if they do not find the game fun, they will not build a house.
The reasons make sense though. You could create the best housing feature-set we have ever seen in a game but if nobody enjoys the game to that point, they will not stick around just to have a cool house.?
Seem as if developers now days see no importance in this feature known as player housing. The quote has a point. If Developers put too much resources into Housing over other features, than players may not be interested in the game and wont build houses regardless of how detailed that feature is.
but why has this feature been tossed under the bus over the last few years? seem like this feature has become very unpopular in the developers offices lately.
Player Housing seem like a dynamic feature that gives players something to do when raiding/leveling/other grinds come to a end. Seem like a win win feature from a consumer point of view, but not from a developer.
What turn of events causes this?
in case nobody has pointed it out yet. My response to the developer is this:
'why not take combat out of the game, I mean if the people like the game enough they will not be worried about combat'
depending on the game focus and depending on how good housing is, housing can easily not be 'fluff' to a game. Although the Sims is not an MMO, if it were I am going to go out on a limb and say that housing would be pretty important to the game.
what devs are doing (on purpose I might add) is narrowing the parameters of what is considered an MMO feature. If they could reduce the parameters of what is a feature list for a standard MMO to 'Street Fighter' I assure you they would.
Love this point or hate it it's true as evidenced by the wool Cryptic tried to pull over our eyes with the last two releases they had pre PWI sale and SOE's DCUO game.
The beauty of the community though is that those three games were roundly unaccpeted to the point that devs may think long and hard before trying those types of tricks again.
For something that has been called a "niche" feature in MMOs, the topic of Housing sure brings out the discussion.
Much like the topic of how "niche" Sandbox MMOs are.
I find it interesting that these 2 things that, by many, arent that popular get the most views and replies.
Maybe they arent as niche as people think they are.
Tried: EQ2 - AC - EU - HZ - TR - MxO - TTO - WURM - SL - VG:SoH - PotBS - PS - AoC - WAR - DDO - SWTOR Played: UO - EQ1 - AO - DAoC - NC - CoH/CoV - SWG - WoW - EVE - AA - LotRO - DFO - STO - FE - MO - RIFT Playing: Skyrim Following: The Repopulation I want a Virtual World, not just a Game. ITS TOO HARD! - Matt Firor (ZeniMax)
look, in the gaming industry what they have actually tired to do with any level of intresting complexity is crazy, ridiculously, insanity small. I cant believe that the main thing 'gaming technology' can provide is combat with trolls.
Just because it hasnt been done with any level of seriousness doesnt mean people wouldnt like it.
The whole game is a virtual dollhouse. Its the sole point of the game. Having such a level of focus on housing would take away from the other features. There's no such thing as infinite development budget. You have to take into account how popular those features or set of features are.
I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been-Wayne Gretzky
look, in the gaming industry what they have actually tired to do with any level of intresting complexity is crazy, ridiculously, insanity small. I cant believe that the main thing 'gaming technology' can provide is combat with trolls.
Just because it hasnt been done with any level of seriousness doesnt mean people wouldnt like it.
The whole game is a virtual dollhouse. Its the sole point of the game. Having such a level of focus on housing would take away from the other features. There's no such thing as infinite development budget. You have to take into account how popular those features or set of features are.
that is why I used it as an example.
1. a game doesnt have to be 100% housing or .5% housing and fulff somewhere inbetween the two extremes perhaps. Come on guys we are all smarter than this!
2. given that a game that is nearly 100% housing and is the best selling PC game EVER. Might be evidence to pause into thinking that a game that has a side fluf of a house doesnt mean people dont like housing it matters on the type of housing features we are talking about.
3. I might add i dont even like housing and I can see how painfully obvious these points are
4. (added) I am not saying a developer should or should not having housing as a feature. I am saying their excuses for not doing it are lame.
Please do not respond to me, even if I ask you a question, its rhetorical.
Comments
Even the feel of that video is incredible... Such a bummer... Some day! Someone will deliver a new fantastically immersive game for many to enjoy, and it will include housing like this.
Even though it was instanced, i absolutely loved housing in FFXI. I don't understand why something to that level hasn't been done again in every new MMO. Instead of sticking a warehouse NPC in town, all that should be handled inside your own personal house. Being able to collect items such as banners or furniture from crafting to increase your vault space is amazing fun. It just adds more "stuff" to do that isn't combat related and i believe that's important for longevity.
With a recall system like UOs, this wouldn't be an issue.... Soon I hope.
I forgot about the guild halls, unreal, they did didn't they? I remember everyone looking forward to that... I also remember beta testing WoW and thinking, "They have everything they need to make guild housing, and more... they can do anything with this.. If they wanted to."
And now, honestly, there is no excuse... $60 million a month for how many years? No excuse.
Btw, I enjoyed WoW for a long time and I still go back and play it every now and then, even though it's not even close to being my favorite game, but it has its entertaining moments.
UO was a unique experience in that before the chinese gold farmers, people would place a house and sell it on ebay. There was really no rule against selling items, and it was crazy to see people pay $$$ for a virtual house. When Trammel hit, people would sit on decaying houses for hours hoping to be the one to pop a new one.
I am glad Rift is bringing a form of housing, can't wait to see what the slivers look like.
Yeah, I definitely got several years of enjoyment out of WoW. Sure, I'm one of those bastards that spews vitriolic comments about "WoW clones", but that's because I expect a different experience if I'm going to spend money on another game to step away from WoW, not engage in content that feels like the game I just left-- but to your other point, yes, they teased us a while back, and I remember my guild freaking out about it, we were all very excited when rumors bubbled out out of the ether. Then... nothing.
Being one of the biggest money makers on the block, there really just wasn't any excuse for them to repeatedly refuse to implement these things. Between this and their refusal to implement armor dyes despite repeated requests by players on their official forums (numerous threads of players comparing themselves to "rodeo clowns"), I had to wonder what in the Hell they were thinking. Especially when you take into consideration that just about every other MMO offers at least one option for armor dyes and/or cosmetic changes to your armor.
It amazes me EA hasn't taken the lead on innovation, but I get the perspective it's just sad.
This is one of the more "telling" and "spot on" comments I have seen regarding MMOs here,there or anywhere.
I do not care what anyone says WoW changed everything in MMOs. The how and why they changed is simple: Before WoW, all MMOs were "niche". It isnt that they had a new way to contact and pitch to a new playerbase, they actually "farmed" up a totaly new playerbase.
I agree with this as a big reason why player housing is no longer considered in an MMO.
I think the point in history when player housing was dropped from MMO development was when WoW was released without player housing. This "proved" that player housing is not necessary to have an immensely successful game.
When I think of a metaphor for this interpretation of player housing, I imagine a fast food restaurant coming up with a hamburger that is the best selilng hamburger for years, but it doesn't have any mustard on it. And so every restaurant chain from this point forward is reluctant to ever put mustard on any of their burgers, because you don't need mustard if you want to make big money selling burgers.
Haha yes, sorry I'm not native english
Where it's a bad thing ? It's a solo-only feature that consumes some vital space in a group-oriented genre.
It's like requesting an Angry Bird minigame in WoW : It can be done, and some people will enjoy it, but it's not a priority at all.
***** Before hitting that reply button, please READ the WHOLE thread you're about to post in *****
Why is it solo only? In SWG, I shared a house with another player. We had a large house on Naboo and lived near a player city which, since it took a gorup of players to build, was also not solo. My structures were almost always open to the public so people wandering the wilds could walk in, use the vendors, check out the decoration, etc. As a merchant, I set up some good relationships with repeat customers that way.
Now, I could certainly make structures private, and in the case of my "crafting workshop" house, I did. But, the option for it to be solo and the mandate that it is solo are two different things. Thats like me choosing to quest solo or grouping up with a buddy to do quests. Really, housing can be a social tool just like anything else, but, as many have stated, it needs to be designed with such goals in mind
edit: saw you added "It's like requesting an Angry Bird minigame in WoW : It can be done, and some people will enjoy it, but it's not a priority at all." and couldn't resist.
Angry Birds might not make it, but plenty of room for Plants vs Zombies eh? (http://youtu.be/aWI5XTmGrmo long video, but you get the point)
-mklinic
"Do something right, no one remembers.
Do something wrong, no one forgets"
-from No One Remembers by In Strict Confidence
Something that every other company in the industy wishes they could manage one tenth as well. Yas indeed.
But most of the worst social fallout effect lies in what it's done to player's expectations.
"Before WoW, all MMOs were "niche"."--and before WoW, 250k was plenty of subs. Now its considered a failure, not worth anyone's time to even try.
We don't expect a feature list similar to WoW's opening day, we expect a feature list of a WoW-right-now mature game. Several times larger game, bug free, orders of magnitude more polished, and for the same cost. Anything less, failure.
And of course, we expect our new games to contain every feature we've ever dreamed of, or some other game fifteen years ago had once.
Self-pity imprisons us in the walls of our own self-absorption. The whole world shrinks down to the size of our problem, and the more we dwell on it, the smaller we are and the larger the problem seems to grow.
in case nobody has pointed it out yet. My response to the developer is this:
'why not take combat out of the game, I mean if the people like the game enough they will not be worried about combat'
depending on the game focus and depending on how good housing is, housing can easily not be 'fluff' to a game. Although the Sims is not an MMO, if it were I am going to go out on a limb and say that housing would be pretty important to the game.
what devs are doing (on purpose I might add) is narrowing the parameters of what is considered an MMO feature. If they could reduce the parameters of what is a feature list for a standard MMO to 'Street Fighter' I assure you they would.
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Cause it is hard to do right, costs money and is seemingly only wanted by a minority of players. So even if a dev had plans to include it, it gets cut by the investors pretty quick.
Seem as if developers now days see no importance in this feature known as player housing. The quote has a point. If Developers put too much resources into Housing over other features, than players may not be interested in the game and wont build houses regardless of how detailed that feature is.but why has this feature been tossed under the bus over the last few years?seem like this feature has become very unpopular in the developers offices lately.Player Housing seem like a dynamic feature that gives players something to do when raiding/leveling/other grinds come to a end. Seem like a win win feature from a consumer point of view, but not from a developer.What turn of events causes this?
Without reading the other replies, here is my take on it. Players play today's games for what, 3-6 months and then leave? Think of all the abandoned houses! Games today have no sense of permanency.
Even the quotes say it all. On one hand, they admit that players are not enjoying their games, for any extended period of time, that is. On the other hand, they use the former as an excuse to not even look at player housing.
To me, this part of the first quote said it all:
If people do not like the game or if they do not find the game fun, they will not build a house.
Maybe, I don't know... Build a FUN game?
- Al
Personally the only modern MMORPG trend that annoys me is the idea that MMOs need to be designed in a way to attract people who don't actually like MMOs. Which to me makes about as much sense as someone trying to figure out a way to get vegetarians to eat at their steakhouse.- FARGIN_WAR
I personally dont care much for housing but I will say this, in my experience I have found most players actually do want housing. Now naturally I play specific MMOs and my experience doesnt represent all gamers but I think its safe to say that a lot of gamers like housing and more specifically good housing.
If you offer a door and one light and call it housing there is a high likely hood that its going to appear that players dont like housing.
On the other hand if your housing rocks...guess what
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Played: UO, EQ, WoW, DDO, SWG, AO, CoH, EvE, TR, AoC, GW, GA, Aion, Allods, lots more
Relatively Recently (Re)Played: HL2 (all), Halo (PC, all), Batman:AA; AC, ME, BS, DA, FO3, DS, Doom (all), LFD1&2, KOTOR, Portal 1&2, Blink, Elder Scrolls (all), lots more
Now Playing: None
Hope: None
The Sims.
look, in the gaming industry what they have actually tired to do with any level of intresting complexity is crazy, ridiculously, insanity small. I cant believe that the main thing 'gaming technology' can provide is combat with trolls.
Just because it hasnt been done with any level of seriousness doesnt mean people wouldnt like it.
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Played: UO, EQ, WoW, DDO, SWG, AO, CoH, EvE, TR, AoC, GW, GA, Aion, Allods, lots more
Relatively Recently (Re)Played: HL2 (all), Halo (PC, all), Batman:AA; AC, ME, BS, DA, FO3, DS, Doom (all), LFD1&2, KOTOR, Portal 1&2, Blink, Elder Scrolls (all), lots more
Now Playing: None
Hope: None
The reason that this has dissapeared is because most game do not have the key elements to drive housing and these are; Longevity/community people just dont play long enogh to care or need a place to show off trophies or their taste in decoration.
Most games at the moment are lazily designed worlds; Combat and endgame in a month yet again lazy design.
With a real MMO where ; Longevity is real (i.e. 2 years gameplay to max level....) and community can form in a real world where the players are playing against the Lore of the world not just trying their epeen out against another guild without a care for the world.
Hopefully we will see a few more MMORPGs released that contain a real charachter buuilding rqt some roleplay , economy and politics all world based.
PvP and twitch based games are not MMOs in a truer sense all you need to prove this is a "X by Y arena" , Auto features that remove gameplay that a real MMO requires need to be removed .. Mail, Insta Travel , Global Auction Houses.
Dont get me wrong ; I can support sandbox worlds with potential MO and Darkfall if you want PvP and an open world but then again I am still convinced Darkfall would sell better with more dungeons / landmass and the PvP removed.
In summary the depth doesnt exist in most games to even warrant Housing as you just wont play the game for long enough for it to matter.
________________________________________________________
Sorcery must persist, the future is the Citadel
1. not to split hairs but you did say 'game' not MMO. That said, throwing in the best selling single player game in gaming history as evidence DOES hold water regardless of if someone doesnt want to agree with it.
2. of course people will pay for it, that is implied. Like I said the VAST majority of what can be done in this technology is not being done so there really dosent exist any baseline to proove other than not being moronic. killing trolls all day is not the only thing people are willing to pay money for and I am willing to bet people would pay money for a game that contains a series of features EXCEPT killing trolls.
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Love this point or hate it it's true as evidenced by the wool Cryptic tried to pull over our eyes with the last two releases they had pre PWI sale and SOE's DCUO game.
The beauty of the community though is that those three games were roundly unaccpeted to the point that devs may think long and hard before trying those types of tricks again.
For something that has been called a "niche" feature in MMOs, the topic of Housing sure brings out the discussion.
Much like the topic of how "niche" Sandbox MMOs are.
I find it interesting that these 2 things that, by many, arent that popular get the most views and replies.
Maybe they arent as niche as people think they are.
Tried: EQ2 - AC - EU - HZ - TR - MxO - TTO - WURM - SL - VG:SoH - PotBS - PS - AoC - WAR - DDO - SWTOR
Played: UO - EQ1 - AO - DAoC - NC - CoH/CoV - SWG - WoW - EVE - AA - LotRO - DFO - STO - FE - MO - RIFT
Playing: Skyrim
Following: The Repopulation
I want a Virtual World, not just a Game.
ITS TOO HARD! - Matt Firor (ZeniMax)
The whole game is a virtual dollhouse. Its the sole point of the game. Having such a level of focus on housing would take away from the other features. There's no such thing as infinite development budget. You have to take into account how popular those features or set of features are.
I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been -Wayne Gretzky
that is why I used it as an example.
1. a game doesnt have to be 100% housing or .5% housing and fulff somewhere inbetween the two extremes perhaps. Come on guys we are all smarter than this!
2. given that a game that is nearly 100% housing and is the best selling PC game EVER. Might be evidence to pause into thinking that a game that has a side fluf of a house doesnt mean people dont like housing it matters on the type of housing features we are talking about.
3. I might add i dont even like housing and I can see how painfully obvious these points are
4. (added) I am not saying a developer should or should not having housing as a feature. I am saying their excuses for not doing it are lame.
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