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Medieval Sandbox MMO from independent team
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Interesting, though I tend to shy away from FFA games as they mostly seem to descend into Lord of the Flies territory....so unless you are in the mood for a really distopean experience...they tend to not be very fun.
Would love to see some faction based or even PVE based sandbox MMO's one of these days.I'll be watching in hopes you all come along more to my thinking. But I think you're limiting yourselves as far as what kind of players you will attract. No complaints, that's up to you. But a little giving on the tiered game play and stagnant centers of activity could go a long ways to including far more gamers, which I think you guys would also find very desireable.
Once upon a time....
Also, just for laughs:
Warp Travel in Warhammer 40.000 explained
I am rather curious why Dev's seem to equate Sandbox + Player Driven Economy + Meaningfull Consequences and possibility of failure (all things I really, really enjoy in a game) with FFA PvP?
I mean certainly FFA PvP can be used to represent such things but Faction based and even PVE could easly embody the same factors.
All that's required for such things is player creative input that changes the game world, possibility of failure and item loss/destruction.
The thing about FFA PvP is that it's actualy a pretty bad model of how societies actualy function, even Medieval Socities..... I mean theoretically anyone can attack and kill anyone but the consequences for doing so without societal sanction, especialy repeatedly are USUALY a RAPID and PERMANENT removable from society. However in these games, "gankers" aren't subjected to perma-death, banishment or perma-imprisonment that would actualy remove them from the society....and even if they were, they could simply roll up new characters to resume such activities....and often through the use of thier own Alts, they are able to avoid most of the societal sanctions that MMO's can levy upon them. Thus they tend to be able to run rampant where otherwise (logicaly) thier activities would be severely restricted and rare.
In any event, nothing wrong with making the game you want to make....it just struck me as rather odd how often Developers seem to equate the concept of Sandbox with FFA PvP.
Might I suggest looking up the term Sandbox before equating it with the Open World genre? They are quite distinct after all.
I really want a sandbox game to implement A Texas Holdem Game system, Where you can house in-game tournys and events with a virtual deck of cards. And Gamble your In-game currency.
It would put a whole new dimension to Adding fluff to a mmorpg. ingame Currency is so much more valuable in sandbox FFA full loot games.
Please someone make this feature happen. Its golden.
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Well how should I put this...you missed the point.
Laptops didnt replace the PC, they didnt replace the PC because their sales were never close to PC sales by the time they reached PC type power.
With mobile devices selling the way they are they can replace the PC long before they can match their power. There is a chance we could end up with most companies doing what these guys are doing, dumbing down the games to match mobile devices long before they can come close to PC power.
I dont reward things like that. With the market being what it is, just like 5 years ago, if a company is going to make a cross platform product, it should have different clients for each one. By not doing so, it says that whatever client is the baseline, in this case, mobile devices...is the most important to the company...and so, I will not support them on the PC.
Lastly...say mobile devices DO match the PCs power in 5 years...after 5 years of companies doing THIS...why would a company then make a game with mouse/keyboard controls? Afterall, mobile is THE market, it can match a PCs power, why even go that far since they have been going without catering to the PC for 5 years...and dont say it wont happen because we have already seen companies attempt to make a game for one platform, port it to another and do almost nothing to cater the new platform.
Or do you not know about Star Wars The Force Unleashed and the fiasco behind the PC port...even part 2 had massive issues with the port because it was done half-assed by a company that didnt really seem to care about PC sales.
I hope we shall crush...in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed corporations, which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength and bid defiance to the laws of our country." ~Thomes Jefferson
Hi all,
just to clarify, in the current state of the game, "classical" FFA PvP does not play a major role, largely due to griefing and zerging concerns.
We have developed a great solution for territory based GvG and structured territory based open PvP that we are quite proud of and of which we think is one of the best innovations of our game.
However, this is something that we do not want to disclose in a piece by piece manner, but rather at a later stage in a proper dev blog or video.
-Dominik
Neah you kinda missed the point by a barn's length at least, you're moaning because the graphics are mobile device level in essence and pretty much demanding different clients with different graphics engines for each platform which I donno if you know doubles the workload of the team's coders, pushes back the launch date by a year maybe even more and when the developers are not backed by anyone and it is a game made off the cookie cutter path of most MMOs these days then you cannot honestly, credibly, ask them to cater to your demands beyond making sure that the graphics are the only thing "dumbed down" for the PC while the aesthetics, gameplay and feeling of the game remain intact which considering the type of game isn't that hard. You gotta remember one simple thing: they stated that the gameplay of the game is something between ultima online and league of legends so in terms of controls there aren't that many to begin with because if we take league's number of skills and assume those are the amount you can have active (possibly with switching out) then you need 10 buttons just to control your character on a mobile device, add in hotkeys for inventory, spell book, options menu, etc and you got at most 20 buttons to map out on a mobile device to make the game work, if they go with touch devices only (which I assume they will as it is iOS6+ and Android probably beyond 4.0) then they can scratch the 4 buttons (arrow hotkeys) from the control scheme and go with "click" control scheme, the options open to them for creating a deep MMO even on a mobile platform are there, the only issue really is deciding on a UI for mobile devices that's intuitive and uses the screen space wisely.
So to put it bluntly: You're moaning it's a game that's cross platform with mobile devices purely on the basis of past experiences (which need I remind you none of which relate to this developer, Hell I can't even name one of their team and I am pretty sure no one else can) and the graphical dumbing down of the game to be capable of running on Apple's overpriced turds. This is your entire beef with the game in a nutshell and while I understand where you are coming from the overt hostility towards a developer who cannot cater to your unrealistic demands, demands which have no bearing on the actual gameplay if the developers do their job right (which considering the passion with which they speak of their game they will be doing) is stretching even my tolerance near breaking point.
PS: Bringing in George era Lucas Arts's Force Unleased 1 and 2 into the discussion is not winning you any points, it just goes to show you cannot tell the difference between a known quanitity with a very bad recent history of customer care and a unknown quantity who aside from your completely subjective view of the industry and its relationship to mobile devices has done pretty much everything a decent developer does (communicate with its fans, answer their questions, give ideas of how the game is, etc etc) and if they keep it up and do their vision justice they'll go from decent to great developers with a solid enjoyable game that while not be the prettiest thing around and will certainly not be ripping your 3-SLI Titan PC with 16 GB of 2200 MHz Ram, 3 SSD with 256 Gb of memory each, 2TB HDD and 1 liquid cooled i7 3940XM a new one it will still be a game worth playing regardless of what you think about its graphics (of all things I honestly thought this would be the last thing people would boycott a game for).
PSS: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5oK8UTRgvJU before anyone wants to counter my arguments for games you could play on mobile devices watch that please and remember I only advocate the "dumbing down" of the graphics side of things, nothing else.
Well, you may have a point there Dihoru, but the devs call Albion Online a "Medieval sandbox" in the title, and I assume GM2 is referring to other mmorpgs going "Sandbox" + FFA cojoined. Is Albion Online more Open World + FFA, then?
I like a lot of what the devs are aiming for, but atst, those pesky concerns that FFA brings in, as pointed out above, how to manage that? If the devs are interested in elaborating on that, would be interesting.
Nonetheless, not going to worry, this game looks like it could provide some solid fun.
http://www.gdcvault.com/play/1014633/Classic-Game-Postmortem
Done.
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
If I understand the explanations in this thread and the copy on the Albion website correctly:
If you can pull that off, you're sitting on a goldmine.
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
Think it's more a case of people saying an Open World is a Sandbox whereas a sandbox in MMOs is freedom of choice both in PVE and PVP terms while also enabling the player to do many, many other things besides, things which could be created by the developers or the gamers themselves (for example you could be a miner or you could be a miner's mule bringing him what he needs, taking away the ore and then splitting the profit equitably, say 40-60) so in my mind them saying it's a Sandbox with FFA is more a case of them telling players that what they accept as a sandbox might not actually be a sandbox if that makes sense.
Read the thread if you haven't already and put it together with what they said on their site, many of the answers you'll need about FFA have already been answered.
So many people being completely clueless talking out of thair ass, with feelings talking instead of their mind.
Sooo, to look at some individulas, this one's good:
You have no idea what ganking means or no idea what full loot means?
They are not tied together and one exists without the other. I'll take WoW as ultimate themepark without full loot, yet it has planty of room for ganking (used to be at least when I played).
Full loot games are more often than not tied to big open worlds. Also more often than not you are not in any way tied to a certain zone to get progress. You have whole world, mobs of all levels would usualy be spread all over the world so you have countless option to move somewhere else if someone looks willing to gank you.
In fact themepark games with PvP enabled make you prone to ganking about 20 times more simply because your progression is completely predictable by the said ganker and usualy you only have very limited options with areas suitable for your level.
Griefing in general goes in same box as the ganking I talked above. It is not directly connected to full loot and can exist and does in fact exist in any themepark game. It is coused by people abusing tools, not by tools alone. Griefing will ALWAYS exist in one or another form, even if it's just verbal abuse. To remove griefing, more often than not you need to remove tools that are getting abused and replace them with different tools, which can in the end drasticaly change the game. In open world game with full loot you always have the option to actualy pay back griefer 8or simply move to one of dozens of other similar places scatered around the world). But you actually have to put some "work" into playing to do that. You need to be socialy acceptable, make friends and than go fight that griefer and pay him back. You can make youself a Quest out of it and get planty of enjoyment on the way.
This is actually the freedom of open world full loot games and why in many books real sanbox can not be without it.
You have to deal with real consequences of your actions which there can be planty, unless you only deal with ball-less, cry-babies who quit sandbox at first sign of trouble blaming everything and everyone but themselves and their feelings, where their feelings are in fact the only thing preventing enjoying a full loot game. "THAT IDIOT STOLE MYYYYY LOOT!! /RAGE QUIT".
And even than, if no one else acts against the griefer, the griefer eventualy has to deal with consequence of driving people away from the game he likes to play and as result he doesn't get to grief much anymore. This is actualy a valid problem with a lot of people being so fragile, but there are good solutions to it. As a developer you just need to tie-in 2 worlds and connect them well, to get both sides happy.
Just like good and bad themepark you have good and bad sandboxes. An example of a good sandbox that tied pieces together very well and is offering much to both full loot open pvp lovers and those who can't stand the heat of a loss, is EvE Online.
All this brings me to the next problem, which is many people not understanding how full loot games play the slightest:
It is completely up to you how to play. Meaning you could take all your loot out of bank, or never bank at all but that would just be simply dumb or maybe hardcore to the bone in some rare cases. if you like gameplay and play a lot (and play safe and thoughtful) your bank will soon be full of stuff . You wear what you can afford and at every "level" you are at, there are tiers of items and mobs that you can kill which provides you dozens and hundreds of items you need. if you use gear suitable to your "level" of character, than dieing a few times per day is as much of a time loss as is repeating some dungeon runs in WoW hunting for your next shiny item.
Now that I'm back from lunch I want to round up my post above with a final paragraph on full loot and why many people can't handle it.
You can hear gamers throwing reasons left and right why they can't stand it but fact is you can quit for all these reasons in other games just as well, with the exception of one.
The number one reason people can't handle full loot is the fact you own an item and than get deeply hurt when that item gets forcefuly taken by another gamer. It doesn't matter how small the item is, even if it was gift and you spent 0 time acquireing it (obviously even worse if you spent time on it) it's the same as when you take a candy away from a kid.
Most of grown-ups learned how to cover such feelings but that doesn't mean you're not hurt by it. And it certainly means your view and perception of the said game are somewhat distorted under the light of a loss. It's normal. The difference between quitters who can't handle it and those who do? Those who like full loot games are jsut as human with feelings meaning they may rage at loss just as much, it's quite natural... with one big difference. At the end of day you know it's just a game.
Something that many, if not most of you people, said out loud or at least thought about it at some point, when confronting emotinal people in the games you played. What did you say? "Relax, it's just a game!"
Ironicaly many didn't know how to use this sentence themselves when confronted with true sandbox playstile.
And you can in fact find similarities to this behaviour in many themeparks. For example have you ever seen the butthurt and the crying of people who deemed a droped rare item rightfully theirs but than got outrolled by someone else who they thought doesn't deserve that item as much as them?
There are games that try to fix this and baby-sit players as much as possible. One of the most recent extremes is GW2, for example. Even I, a fan of full loot open world no safe zones pvp games, find it good in theory and am happy that people have such options.
It's way too boring for me tho. And am sad that there are so many gamers, who I can see from their clueless posts, don't even really understand a proper full loot game, yet still feel like posting their rather distorted views out in public, trying to force their shortsighted opinions.
Meh, I'm goign places... just remember...
IT'S JUST A GAME
May be, it's just that there wasn't a single MMORPG in existance when Albert wrote that. Because he obviously didn't know you can do an exact same boss run 10 times and get a different result (loot item droped) each time. lol
Secondly, I don't see it apply to full loot FFA PvP very well because compared to the sea of games without full loot FFA PvP they are in huge minority. Specialy the kind that would get good care by their developers, the developers who with their lack of work or proper decisions drive the player base down.
On contrary it applies rather well to all the companies doing themepark carbon copies and expecting WoW kind results.
First off your quote is a paraphrase and second off it isn't Einstein's.
However this one is:
"Few people are capable of expressing with equanimity opinions that differ from the prejudices of their social environment. Most people are even incapable of forming such opinions."
-Albert Einstein
Actually the fact you can repeat in quantum mechanics the same set of measurements under the same conditions and get wildly different results is the main reason why Einstein loathed the Heisenberg Uncertainty principal and never accepted quantum mechanics as being a true science because in his view "It seems hard to sneak a look at God's cards. But that He plays dice and uses "telepathic" methods... it is something that I cannot believe for a single moment." (not the insanity definition which many people attribute to him but which has been conclusively shown not to have originated from him)
Now that you put it this way I can't believe Albert would indeed write something so easily proven wrong using a single THEMEPARK game.
BadSpock! (pun intended)
Technically speaking it can be proven right because doing A will always result in B in a themepark (IE raiding will always result in loot, regardless of the type of loot one action leads to one finite, knowable result), the problem with Heisenberg's principal is that it says it is impossible to know at the same time both the position of a subatomic particle and its momentum because to do so would require a measuring process wherein one of those two would be altered, ergo while you could know the particle's position in point x that moment in time is the same moment you altered its momentum via the measuring process ( Heisenberg used the example of measuring the momentum and then having to determine the position of the particle via bombardment with photons or electrons or exposure to electromagnetic fields both of which would affect its momentum), this is why Einstein never accepted the principal because in his mind it meant there were areas where humanity no matter how much effort would put into uncovering its secrets never actually would which went against the core of his beliefs (that nothing in the Universe is truly random or utterly unknowable).
The features you quoted above are already working. We are now currently trying to polish them to make these few features even better. But as we all know the details matter and this is where we now are trying to run as many tests as possible to balance everything.
A medieval sandbox MMO
http://www.facebook.com/albiononline/
It seems like they'd have to use some sort of Battlegrounds system for this.
It's getting so that I hate to apply terms to things, but this doesn't seem like an open world Sandbox to me. That's not to say that it can't be a fine game, I'm still very curious about the specifics and the game as a whole. It just doesn't sound like the Sandbox game I'd really like to see. But lacking having one of them, a good alternative still might be in play.
From my perspective, the ideal situation is to make warfare cost a boatload, so that attacking someone is costly and weekens you to other possibilities. While a 5 person guild can use this tactically for defense, but not claim a dominant position on their own. I see that scenario (a mere 5 person guild gaining a dominant power position) as bad, and think that numbers and cooperation and all the player to player interaction is as important in building a social powerhouse as resources are.
Once upon a time....
I dissagree with that, simply because you've made up your own system in which the end result is loot as such. But you can't just remove and ignore a constant pretending it is not there...
In my (actual) system the end result acknowledges the type of loot as well, meaning the first quote can not be proven right.
Even if we take your system and say you're right, a simple "no loot result"( because loot can either drop or not) seems very possible which would make your theory wrong.
Smart people > Something awful/reddit zerg :P
The game would be far better off served by having balance such that smart people can dominate in smaller groups even facing massive zergs, this is the one point where I kinda dislike EVE-Online... no matter how smart you are if the other guy can zerg you to death it's a lost battle.
Name one themepark game where you kill something and you get nothing for your effort besides experience.