I liked your article and it will be nice hearing from a developer as i love reading the developer perspective on things. With that said, I hope this first article doesn't run you away honestly because some of the more prominent posters on this site will, and from what i've seen already, have torn your article to shreds because that is just simply what they live to do.
I am personally glad you're here, but i don't want this to be be a "one and done" article for you. I play GW2 pretty heavily and will enjoy it and the original for years to come, however i can see why some people simply don't agree with the hub system being "gone" because it's not. The responses did take your words and the title too literally, but again, some of these guys can't wait to take anything ever written on this site too literally.
One thing thats missing from all these games is Mystery
My dream with the genre is to have an epic adventure.
I love quest's... well written quest's... to me there is a difference between a quest and mundane tasks. I also like DE's and can see them grow and mature into something much greater then they are at this point in time
I like the concept of collecting the skill point's in GW2 but wish they were not marked and needed to be discovered by adventure and exploration. I wish that nobody knew how many there were.
I tire of level progression
you know there's places that are mysterious in game like a door I and others ran into that you had to do something special to open that was off the beaten path, or mysterious underwater caves with mazes in them. It's not all level progression in GW2 that's one of the things that makes it great, they didn't just make walls and not fill them with caves or mysteries.
I Have come across some very cool places also, Arenanet did a wonderful job at world design. I wish that they didnt show you where everything was. I love that everyone can farm a node but hate that they are shown on the map. Early this morning I walked behind a waterfall, swam through some tunnels and ended up in a cavern with a rich iron node, the only thing that destroyed this experiance from being totally awesome... was that I could see the node before i got there... it took away a nice surprise in what would have been an awesome feeling of discovery.
People can read wiki sites but that dosnt mean that I have to read and wreck my own experiance.
Sorry but replacing something (quest hubs) with something which is quite similar (heart quests, clearly marked out on the map) is not killing the former thing. But it kind of shows why the state of MMORPG industry is so stale because changes are so small and minute that they really dont matter.
I mean what is the big difference between going to an NPC with an exclamation mark and getting a quest and going to a heart icon on the map to do a quest? Even dynamic quests are not that different, it is basically like a moving NPC with an exclamation mark except you dont need to click on the exclamation mark. It is different but more similar than different.
What should happen, and I have waited years for this to happen, is for public quests to have a real impact on the persistant world. For example, some NPC faction invades an area and the "quest" is to push them back, if people don't then these NPCs will push further and further, threatening NPC towns and even eventually the capital and it is only by people banding together and pushing them back that the zone will go back to the initial state. However it should not end there, because if you do that then another quest chain should be started where players get the opportunity to invade the invaders and have quests triggered from that.
This is what I expected Dynamic Events to be like, unfourtunately they are far from that... more like a small evolution from Rifts and Public Quests in WAR.
Heh, in case you don't know, what you have posted.. "NPC faction invades an area and the "quest" is to push them back, if people don't then these NPCs will push further and further, threatening NPC towns and even eventually the capital and it is only by people banding together and pushing them back that the zone will go back to the initial state" is pretty much what FireFall is going to be like . These game mechanics are in their most basic states in the beta right now.
Silly article. Wow did nothing, some other game had not done before by WoWs release. They copied everything here and there and there. Blizzard had the greatest name of that time and did the most advertising of games ever with WoW. Nothing more. I am so tired of this endles and most times wrong WoW talk *sigh*
TSW questing. I like that, if you are observant you can find quests, not every quest is part of the main storyline. it's fun to just search around and explore, you never know what you may find.
Indeed. It's interesting how the questing in GW2 gets so much attention and praise, when at its core the questing in TSW functions in much the same way and is slightly better at that in my own humble opinion.
TSW isn't hub based either, and designed so that your progression in a zone is fairly non-linear. You explore to find most of the missions in TSW as well, some are easy to find others are hidden away to be stumbled upon when poking around. Just like GW2. Both also limit the amount of quests/missions you have at your disposal at any given time, though by different means and intents. DE or Mission, both also string you along for different objectives without the need to interact with any "hub" elements.
I guess my point here is that TSW is just as relevant if we are talking about the "death of the quest hub".
Originally posted by illmaculate What a ridiculous article. Instead of talking to an NPC with a "!" above his head you wander into an area to do the same thing you'd do following talking to said NPC. Quest hubs in GW2 are entire zones. Derp.
And horray for that. It makes a huge difference to the enjoyment of the game. You should feel like you are in a game world, not Wal-Mart.
Dynamic events as made in GW2 are just same old grind. You pretty much have always to kill stuff. I dont see how anyone can like this more then quality quests in TSW. Idea is promising tho and I hope it will be used for future MMOs in more varied and interactive way. It also shouldnt be core game mechanic imo, just a thing to make world feel living and changing
Lol I love it. You can always tell when someone hasn't played GW2 because they get their assumptions 'horribly' wrong. GW2 has the least linear zone design since EQ. No game since then has offered so much to explorers either. I'm not talking about map completion either. I've found beautiful locations in the game that were only put in for explorers, as they are often out of the way and hard to spot. When I lead friends there in game they are blown away by that simple fact.
It's so refreshing after the recent surge of 'cardboar scenery' MMOGs like SWTOR.
Exactly this. The only thing that is linear is the story line...and that is because all story lines must be linear, lol.
That has been one of my biggest peeves in gaming is the hand holding and markers.I enjoyed FFXI which had NEITHER,no markers and no hand holding,so it felt like an adult game.
I might point out that Wow was/is not the heaviest questing game EQ2 imo is.We don't really even need to compare Wow and EQ2 they are both copies in 90% of the design from EQ.
It is obvious Mr.Kern copied other game ideas,especially EQ because FFXi was not a copy cat game,they did NOT offer xp for quests ,however Wow did,so they chose to copy rather than be creative or unique.
Now onto GW2.I see so many quick to make claim that they are different and it is the BEST idea.This all depends on the user because there are reasons it is not the best.
They still use map markers,so replacing npc markers for map markers is still un realistic and still hand holding.
Also their content can at times just magically float out of mid air just by walking up to a tree,again very unrealistic,it offers nothing to that immersive feeling.
Also i have no idea why so many are giving GW2 so much credit for ideas that were already done long before them,proof is my example of FFXI "NO quest hubs".So neither is it creative nor unique nor is it bringing us into new territory.The ONLY difference i have found is ANet has done a heck of a lot more marketing and bragging about it ,where as many have NEVER played FFXI to even realize they already been there donbe that and to a BETTER degree.
Now it will take too many examples and far too much to describe every detail,but i will chime on a couple.
This looting system is flat out a negative to the game.People are more concerned with how much damage they can do rather than fun or helping each other.Imagine this.....
You got to gether 5 random people to farm a dungeon.Then all a sudden some super elite drop falls from the boss.Now what would the other 5 players say if that one player said "I deserve this drop because i did the most damage' ??Seriously it would be met with a ton of anger,so why is this same approach accepted in GW2?I think again it is because Anet has done the most misleading sell job i have ever seen,they take every single aspect of the game and tell people how great it is.
One more small point is that in a ROLE playing game,you would not expect one to be staring at a map looking for an event,this is a linear design that drives players to follow the games push in one direction.There is of course the argument ,i'd rather run around chasing quests than just killing,i most certainly understand that,but saying GW2 way is the BEST way is far from the truth,it is imo EXACTLY like a quest hub game because you are following quests the same way.The fact they have progresion or mutiple lines is again far from being new,just about every game on the planet has already done that.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
Lol I love it. You can always tell when someone hasn't played GW2 because they get their assumptions 'horribly' wrong. GW2 has the least linear zone design since EQ.
Depends on how you look at it, the map still has relevant level ranges marked out on them creating a path for a player to follow. And pushing a couple of levels more than you currently are is, while doable, often harder. Which means the average player could still be running a fairly predictable path. The variety comes from which events are available at the time a player passes through I suppose.
2 run around clicking on everyone with a ! flying above their head
3 gather 10 - 20 quests
4 look at the circles that now show on your map
5 kill shit and collect stuff within the circles until thoose circles disapear
6 go back to the town, run around clicking everyone with a ? flying over there head, then click OK, sometimes you may get asked to pick some loot, so dont click too fast
7 wait some of thoose dudes have ! flying above their heads again, best talk to them, collect 10 more quests
8 go play the circles on the map game again, you will notice you will have to kill the stuff you killed before to get to the new stuff you need to kill now. That guy back in town changed his mind he doesn't need black bear arses for his new hat he needs brown bear arses instead
9 return and click the question marks
10 oh theres one dude with a ! over his head, lets click him
11 theres a circle on the map over another village, travel there click the ? guy then run around clicking all the ! guys
12 RINSE REPEAT
Both GW2 and TSW break that, neither game does that. Before these 2 games (unless you are going back to very old games) I would only play games that let me level in PVP, because that hub style questing is pure unadulterated tedious garbage.
That has been one of my biggest peeves in gaming is the hand holding and markers.I enjoyed FFXI which had NEITHER,no markers and no hand holding,so it felt like an adult game.
I might point out that Wow was/is not the heaviest questing game EQ2 imo is.We don't really even need to compare Wow and EQ2 they are both copies in 90% of the design from EQ.
It is obvious Mr.Kern copied other game ideas,especially EQ because FFXi was not a copy cat game,they did NOT offer xp for quests ,however Wow did,so they chose to copy rather than be creative or unique.
Now onto GW2.I see so many quick to make claim that they are different and it is the BEST idea.This all depends on the user because there are reasons it is not the best.
They still use map markers,so replacing npc markers for map markers is still un realistic and still hand holding.
Also their content can at times just magically float out of mid air just by walking up to a tree,again very unrealistic,it offers nothing to that immersive feeling.
Also i have no idea why so many are giving GW2 so much credit for ideas that were already done long before them,proof is my example of FFXI "NO quest hubs".So neither is it creative nor unique nor is it bringing us into new territory.The ONLY difference i have found is ANet has done a heck of a lot more marketing and bragging about it ,where as many have NEVER played FFXI to even realize they already been there donbe that and to a BETTER degree.
Now it will take too many examples and far too much to describe every detail,but i will chime on a couple.
This looting system is flat out a negative to the game.People are more concerned with how much damage they can do rather than fun or helping each other.Imagine this.....
You got to gether 5 random people to farm a dungeon.Then all a sudden some super elite drop falls from the boss.Now what would the other 5 players say if that one player said "I deserve this drop because i did the most damage' ??Seriously it would be met with a ton of anger,so why is this same approach accepted in GW2?I think again it is because Anet has done the most misleading sell job i have ever seen,they take every single aspect of the game and tell people how great it is.
One more small point is that in a ROLE playing game,you would not expect one to be staring at a map looking for an event,this is a linear design that drives players to follow the games push in one direction.There is of course the argument ,i'd rather run around chasing quests than just killing,i most certainly understand that,but saying GW2 way is the BEST way is far from the truth,it is imo EXACTLY like a quest hub game because you are following quests the same way.The fact they have progresion or mutiple lines is again far from being new,just about every game on the planet has already done that.
FFXI is a kill mob grind, pretty simple really. And like you I would understand how some folks really like that.
Your example has nothing to do with how GW2 works, its not a competition for who does the most damage it would be more like a threshold that whoever passes it gets your "super elite drop". And to add to that you get more rewards for rezing other players than killing stuff.
so DE's were implemented in such a way that before hearts were thrown in no one had any idea where to go or what to do and which DE's were accessible and which they needed to come back for?
Sounds to me like some sort of MMO should whip out a design scheme where your level is only relevent in the sense of what skills and perks and stats you have available to you, but the content of the game should change passively to reflect your current level regardless of where you are or what you are doing. Something like how FF8 worked or those crazy elder scrolls or fallout games in a way. unless i'm mistaken, but what i mean is no matter the order you explore the world in, no matter the direction, all content is simply adjusted to suit your current level dynamically. It would also make it jawesome so that you could be, say, level 80 and grouped up with a lvl 40, 10, 3, and 56 players all at the same time, each of you doing the exact same quest and/or dungeon content simutaneously and everything is everyone's level from their perspective so each can contribute to every fight in so much as their level facilitates. IMPOSSIBLE?! perhaps. GOOD IDEA?!?!?!!? yes.
I do remember that the questgivers in Meridian 59 had something over their head in 1996, cant remember what tough.... But whatever.
Questhubs needs to go, I agree with that but personally do I wish that GW2 had skipped the heart quests as well. They are not exactly questhubs but still a bit too similar for my taste, just exploring and do DEs are way more fun.
There is potential in DEs and I would really love a sandbox/themepark hybrid with a mix of DE and player generated content.
Totally disagree. I have no desire to return to the days of EQ. The best thing that wow did was introduce the question mark for quests. I am wading through the 15 -25 zones and the grid is wearing me down. Yes I can find DE but almost all of them need a group to succeed. It seems that at least half of the dynamic events are escort quests. I hated these in every other mmo and I don't like them in GW2 either. One thing for sure - I have NEVER seen a game with so many escort quests.
I am like many - underpowered for the zone levels. I know why - the initial zerg is gone to higher zones. I don't care what anyone says - GW2 is solo un-friendly. Read every "having a wonderful time" thread and you will see that the author is part of the zerg or a group. The higher level you go the harder it is to solo. I thought I might hit the wall at 30 but 25 is looking like the end.
This is a great game but it is NOT for solo players like me.
Yes, I will agree that "Quest Hubs" have been dealt a Death-Knell in GW2. However, zones are still horrbily linear, and quests are just "Prettied" up by hiding all the relevant data behind a "Progress Bar". However, the grindyness & ease of GW2 lends itself to a standard themepark, of which it fits perfectly into.
The renown hearts are hardly liner, you can go where you want it is your choice. As for the progress bar, it is hardly just for you, unless you are the only one in the areas performing the duties.. otherwise other players in that area are contributing to that same progress bar.
Yes, I will agree that "Quest Hubs" have been dealt a Death-Knell in GW2. However, zones are still horrbily linear, and quests are just "Prettied" up by hiding all the relevant data behind a "Progress Bar". However, the grindyness & ease of GW2 lends itself to a standard themepark, of which it fits perfectly into.
The renown hearts are hardly liner, you can go where you want it is your choice. As for the progress bar, it is hardly just for you, unless you are the only one in the areas performing the duties.. otherwise other players in that area are contributing to that same progress bar.
Well in terms of that progress bar, if its a heart quest thats all on you. Events of course are counted for everyone. Hearts are pretty linear in terms of how to do many of them, but they feel flexible enough to make it look fresh. No chains or the likes to bog you down is a nice feature as well.
The quest presentation has changed, but not the activities you do. It is still the same thing you did in any other MMO. Nothing revolutionary or different than 10 years ago.
Originally posted by Torgrim
If you are so smart why don't you come up with something that's never been done before?
I´m not a game designer, but as a player I can say, there is nothing innovative about GW2 questing. Nothing. No mission to craft anything, no quest to investigate something or solve something in a challenging, non-combative way. No missions which make you interact with other players in some, new innovative way. And what bugs me the most, no brain puzzles like in Rift or Secret World (Jumping "Puzzles" don´t count sorry, I could as well hunt datacrons in SWTOR).
The only MMO which does those things to give you more variety in questing between the non-stop killing is Secret World. Quests involve crafting devices, solving puzzles, identify or scan mobs first before you need to kill them or use some sonar like tracking device to find specific locations. The kill X missions are never blatantly presented as "go there and kill X" or collect eggs to put them back into a ravens nest.
I mean even if you are forced to kill X in any MMO, TOR and TSW at least give you movie scene like story and interesting cutscenes to watch. GW2 puts two characters in front of a still background and that is quite below the 2012 standards set by TOR and TSW.
Conclusion, GW2 is standard 2003 questing with a new way how to receive quests, but very unsatisfying story presentation. The "innovation" award is not deserved by GW2, just by replacing questgivers by "dynamic" yellow circles, sorry
The quest presentation has changed, but not the activities you do. It is still the same thing you did in any other MMO. Nothing revolutionary or different than 10 years ago.
Originally posted by Torgrim
If you are so smart why don't you come up with something that's never been done before?
I´m not a game designer, but as a player I can say, there is nothing innovative about GW2 questing. Nothing. No mission to craft anything, no quest to investigate something or solve something in a challenging, non-combative way. No missions which make you interact with other players in some, new innovative way. And what bugs me the most, no brain puzzles like in Rift or Secret World (Jumping "Puzzles" don´t count sorry, I could as well hunt datacrons in SWTOR).
The only MMO which does those things to give you more variety in questing between the non-stop killing is Secret World. Quests involve crafting devices, solving puzzles, identify or scan mobs first before you need to kill them or use some sonar like tracking device to find specific locations. The kill X missions are never blatantly presented as "go there and kill X" or collect eggs to put them back into a ravens nest.
I mean even if you are forced to kill X in any MMO, TOR and TSW at least give you movie scene like story and interesting cutscenes to watch. GW2 puts two characters in front of a still background and that is quite below the 2012 standards set by TOR and TSW.
Conclusion, GW2 is standard 2003 questing with a new way how to receive quests, but very unsatisfying story presentation. The "innovation" award is not deserved by GW2, just by replacing questgivers by "dynamic" yellow circles, sorry
Inb4 someone tells you to stick to single player RPGs.
Apparently questing or "dynamic eventing" in MMORPGs should be all about killing 10 bandits and watering plants.
Um...I did not read the article, and I do offer my apologies for that. I only read the snippet, and well - I had to laugh. I mean, coughing up a lung and snot dripping out my nose laughing. The sheer audacity and blind ignorance of people making statements like that drives me apeshit...even 7 years later. But then again, we all know that all of the games that came out years before WoW were just clones of WoW...right? /sigh
I miss the MMORPG genre. Will a developer ever make one again?
Why wasn't I informed of the death of quest hubs? They are still there in almost every game. Am I to understand then when any game does something different, it "kills" the industry standard that it broke from?
It's pretty BIG HEADED to think that don't you think?
I think you really picked a place to write your article, since MMORPG.com is most likely the single most hateful place in the MMO universe, so good luck with that.
I agree with many of the opinions here when they mention that hearts are basically covered up questhubs and lets be frank, most dynamic events aren't actually all that dynamic. They occur, always at the same place, always in the same order and most of them don't even have an order. They're one time things. That said, any form of progress is a form of progress and it's at least an attempt to improve the current generation of MMO's.
That said, Firefall, well, it's just a grind isn't it? Just playing the Thumper game with gear as a goal instead of a means. Do you really think that's going to cut it once people find out that the tutorial is the only questline in the entire game?
Would have been more fun if the game continued the Cowboy Bebop vibe I was getting.
Comments
I liked your article and it will be nice hearing from a developer as i love reading the developer perspective on things. With that said, I hope this first article doesn't run you away honestly because some of the more prominent posters on this site will, and from what i've seen already, have torn your article to shreds because that is just simply what they live to do.
I am personally glad you're here, but i don't want this to be be a "one and done" article for you. I play GW2 pretty heavily and will enjoy it and the original for years to come, however i can see why some people simply don't agree with the hub system being "gone" because it's not. The responses did take your words and the title too literally, but again, some of these guys can't wait to take anything ever written on this site too literally.
Based on some of the responses regarding quest hubs, pretty much every game ever made can be called a quest hub.
Hell ,based on the logic expressed in the comments here, life itself is a questhub, therefore life sucks!
First quest - alarm clock triggers event - get out of bed. Go Brush teeth. Take shower. Get dressed. Quest complete!
What's the next quest? Oh yeah, drive to work! Mother f*n quest hub!
Too funny.
Great article.
I have to ask, do people enjoy going from random unmarked NPC to random unmarked NPC to see if they have a quest or something interesting to say?
I hated doing that in single player RPGs, why would I want to do it in a MMORPG?
I Have come across some very cool places also, Arenanet did a wonderful job at world design. I wish that they didnt show you where everything was. I love that everyone can farm a node but hate that they are shown on the map. Early this morning I walked behind a waterfall, swam through some tunnels and ended up in a cavern with a rich iron node, the only thing that destroyed this experiance from being totally awesome... was that I could see the node before i got there... it took away a nice surprise in what would have been an awesome feeling of discovery.
People can read wiki sites but that dosnt mean that I have to read and wreck my own experiance.
"Be water my friend" - Bruce Lee
Heh, in case you don't know, what you have posted.. "NPC faction invades an area and the "quest" is to push them back, if people don't then these NPCs will push further and further, threatening NPC towns and even eventually the capital and it is only by people banding together and pushing them back that the zone will go back to the initial state" is pretty much what FireFall is going to be like
. These game mechanics are in their most basic states in the beta right now.
Indeed. It's interesting how the questing in GW2 gets so much attention and praise, when at its core the questing in TSW functions in much the same way and is slightly better at that in my own humble opinion.
TSW isn't hub based either, and designed so that your progression in a zone is fairly non-linear. You explore to find most of the missions in TSW as well, some are easy to find others are hidden away to be stumbled upon when poking around. Just like GW2. Both also limit the amount of quests/missions you have at your disposal at any given time, though by different means and intents. DE or Mission, both also string you along for different objectives without the need to interact with any "hub" elements.
I guess my point here is that TSW is just as relevant if we are talking about the "death of the quest hub".
And horray for that. It makes a huge difference to the enjoyment of the game. You should feel like you are in a game world, not Wal-Mart.
Dynamic events as made in GW2 are just same old grind. You pretty much have always to kill stuff. I dont see how anyone can like this more then quality quests in TSW. Idea is promising tho and I hope it will be used for future MMOs in more varied and interactive way. It also shouldnt be core game mechanic imo, just a thing to make world feel living and changing
Exactly this. The only thing that is linear is the story line...and that is because all story lines must be linear, lol.
Ok first of all i hate you..lol /joking
That has been one of my biggest peeves in gaming is the hand holding and markers.I enjoyed FFXI which had NEITHER,no markers and no hand holding,so it felt like an adult game.
I might point out that Wow was/is not the heaviest questing game EQ2 imo is.We don't really even need to compare Wow and EQ2 they are both copies in 90% of the design from EQ.
It is obvious Mr.Kern copied other game ideas,especially EQ because FFXi was not a copy cat game,they did NOT offer xp for quests ,however Wow did,so they chose to copy rather than be creative or unique.
Now onto GW2.I see so many quick to make claim that they are different and it is the BEST idea.This all depends on the user because there are reasons it is not the best.
They still use map markers,so replacing npc markers for map markers is still un realistic and still hand holding.
Also their content can at times just magically float out of mid air just by walking up to a tree,again very unrealistic,it offers nothing to that immersive feeling.
Also i have no idea why so many are giving GW2 so much credit for ideas that were already done long before them,proof is my example of FFXI "NO quest hubs".So neither is it creative nor unique nor is it bringing us into new territory.The ONLY difference i have found is ANet has done a heck of a lot more marketing and bragging about it ,where as many have NEVER played FFXI to even realize they already been there donbe that and to a BETTER degree.
Now it will take too many examples and far too much to describe every detail,but i will chime on a couple.
This looting system is flat out a negative to the game.People are more concerned with how much damage they can do rather than fun or helping each other.Imagine this.....
You got to gether 5 random people to farm a dungeon.Then all a sudden some super elite drop falls from the boss.Now what would the other 5 players say if that one player said "I deserve this drop because i did the most damage' ??Seriously it would be met with a ton of anger,so why is this same approach accepted in GW2?I think again it is because Anet has done the most misleading sell job i have ever seen,they take every single aspect of the game and tell people how great it is.
One more small point is that in a ROLE playing game,you would not expect one to be staring at a map looking for an event,this is a linear design that drives players to follow the games push in one direction.There is of course the argument ,i'd rather run around chasing quests than just killing,i most certainly understand that,but saying GW2 way is the BEST way is far from the truth,it is imo EXACTLY like a quest hub game because you are following quests the same way.The fact they have progresion or mutiple lines is again far from being new,just about every game on the planet has already done that.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
Depends on how you look at it, the map still has relevant level ranges marked out on them creating a path for a player to follow. And pushing a couple of levels more than you currently are is, while doable, often harder. Which means the average player could still be running a fairly predictable path. The variety comes from which events are available at the time a player passes through I suppose.
heres what quest hub gameplay is to me
1 go to a village
2 run around clicking on everyone with a ! flying above their head
3 gather 10 - 20 quests
4 look at the circles that now show on your map
5 kill shit and collect stuff within the circles until thoose circles disapear
6 go back to the town, run around clicking everyone with a ? flying over there head, then click OK, sometimes you may get asked to pick some loot, so dont click too fast
7 wait some of thoose dudes have ! flying above their heads again, best talk to them, collect 10 more quests
8 go play the circles on the map game again, you will notice you will have to kill the stuff you killed before to get to the new stuff you need to kill now. That guy back in town changed his mind he doesn't need black bear arses for his new hat he needs brown bear arses instead
9 return and click the question marks
10 oh theres one dude with a ! over his head, lets click him
11 theres a circle on the map over another village, travel there click the ? guy then run around clicking all the ! guys
12 RINSE REPEAT
Both GW2 and TSW break that, neither game does that. Before these 2 games (unless you are going back to very old games) I would only play games that let me level in PVP, because that hub style questing is pure unadulterated tedious garbage.
FFXI is a kill mob grind, pretty simple really. And like you I would understand how some folks really like that.
Your example has nothing to do with how GW2 works, its not a competition for who does the most damage it would be more like a threshold that whoever passes it gets your "super elite drop". And to add to that you get more rewards for rezing other players than killing stuff.
so DE's were implemented in such a way that before hearts were thrown in no one had any idea where to go or what to do and which DE's were accessible and which they needed to come back for?
Sounds to me like some sort of MMO should whip out a design scheme where your level is only relevent in the sense of what skills and perks and stats you have available to you, but the content of the game should change passively to reflect your current level regardless of where you are or what you are doing. Something like how FF8 worked or those crazy elder scrolls or fallout games in a way. unless i'm mistaken, but what i mean is no matter the order you explore the world in, no matter the direction, all content is simply adjusted to suit your current level dynamically. It would also make it jawesome so that you could be, say, level 80 and grouped up with a lvl 40, 10, 3, and 56 players all at the same time, each of you doing the exact same quest and/or dungeon content simutaneously and everything is everyone's level from their perspective so each can contribute to every fight in so much as their level facilitates. IMPOSSIBLE?! perhaps. GOOD IDEA?!?!?!!? yes.
I do remember that the questgivers in Meridian 59 had something over their head in 1996, cant remember what tough.... But whatever.
Questhubs needs to go, I agree with that but personally do I wish that GW2 had skipped the heart quests as well. They are not exactly questhubs but still a bit too similar for my taste, just exploring and do DEs are way more fun.
There is potential in DEs and I would really love a sandbox/themepark hybrid with a mix of DE and player generated content.
Totally disagree. I have no desire to return to the days of EQ. The best thing that wow did was introduce the question mark for quests. I am wading through the 15 -25 zones and the grid is wearing me down. Yes I can find DE but almost all of them need a group to succeed. It seems that at least half of the dynamic events are escort quests. I hated these in every other mmo and I don't like them in GW2 either. One thing for sure - I have NEVER seen a game with so many escort quests.
I am like many - underpowered for the zone levels. I know why - the initial zerg is gone to higher zones. I don't care what anyone says - GW2 is solo un-friendly. Read every "having a wonderful time" thread and you will see that the author is part of the zerg or a group. The higher level you go the harder it is to solo. I thought I might hit the wall at 30 but 25 is looking like the end.
This is a great game but it is NOT for solo players like me.
The renown hearts are hardly liner, you can go where you want it is your choice. As for the progress bar, it is hardly just for you, unless you are the only one in the areas performing the duties.. otherwise other players in that area are contributing to that same progress bar.
Well in terms of that progress bar, if its a heart quest thats all on you. Events of course are counted for everyone. Hearts are pretty linear in terms of how to do many of them, but they feel flexible enough to make it look fresh. No chains or the likes to bog you down is a nice feature as well.
THIS.
The quest presentation has changed, but not the activities you do. It is still the same thing you did in any other MMO. Nothing revolutionary or different than 10 years ago.
I´m not a game designer, but as a player I can say, there is nothing innovative about GW2 questing. Nothing. No mission to craft anything, no quest to investigate something or solve something in a challenging, non-combative way. No missions which make you interact with other players in some, new innovative way. And what bugs me the most, no brain puzzles like in Rift or Secret World (Jumping "Puzzles" don´t count sorry, I could as well hunt datacrons in SWTOR).
The only MMO which does those things to give you more variety in questing between the non-stop killing is Secret World. Quests involve crafting devices, solving puzzles, identify or scan mobs first before you need to kill them or use some sonar like tracking device to find specific locations. The kill X missions are never blatantly presented as "go there and kill X" or collect eggs to put them back into a ravens nest.
I mean even if you are forced to kill X in any MMO, TOR and TSW at least give you movie scene like story and interesting cutscenes to watch. GW2 puts two characters in front of a still background and that is quite below the 2012 standards set by TOR and TSW.
Conclusion, GW2 is standard 2003 questing with a new way how to receive quests, but very unsatisfying story presentation. The "innovation" award is not deserved by GW2, just by replacing questgivers by "dynamic" yellow circles, sorry
Inb4 someone tells you to stick to single player RPGs.
Apparently questing or "dynamic eventing" in MMORPGs should be all about killing 10 bandits and watering plants.
I miss the MMORPG genre. Will a developer ever make one again?
Explorer: 87%, Killer: 67%, Achiever: 27%, Socializer: 20%
"Quest Hubs Are Dead, Finally!"
Why wasn't I informed of the death of quest hubs? They are still there in almost every game. Am I to understand then when any game does something different, it "kills" the industry standard that it broke from?
It's pretty BIG HEADED to think that don't you think?
Well, MRKern,
I think you really picked a place to write your article, since MMORPG.com is most likely the single most hateful place in the MMO universe, so good luck with that.
I agree with many of the opinions here when they mention that hearts are basically covered up questhubs and lets be frank, most dynamic events aren't actually all that dynamic. They occur, always at the same place, always in the same order and most of them don't even have an order. They're one time things. That said, any form of progress is a form of progress and it's at least an attempt to improve the current generation of MMO's.
That said, Firefall, well, it's just a grind isn't it? Just playing the Thumper game with gear as a goal instead of a means. Do you really think that's going to cut it once people find out that the tutorial is the only questline in the entire game?
Would have been more fun if the game continued the Cowboy Bebop vibe I was getting.