Is something like Shards Online the answer? Player-created, player-curated shards? Like the Minecraft model in an MMO. I just don't know.
Shards Online as the usual struggles of the indie games, but it has one really good idea in the game that it is, that if it wasn't that top-down approach it could be just amazing.
So does Boundless, also a different design into connecting it all together into a proper MMO. All of these ideas still in development but we'll see.
... Look, there is a one way to look at how to manage a business. Lean design is vogue and I hate it. These smaller games are promoted as smaller but better because we don't have to focus on all that extra areas. If they really make it great that might be ok, but they should own that they are being thrifty about the project.
I love to explore world even if it doesn't provide loot/xp etc. In fact, after GW2 I think I prefer if there isn't any benefit exploration than just being there. A larger world is better for me as an explorer. The smaller they make the world the more they should consider just making a damn lobby game. Don't bother with the pretense of having a world for an mmoRPG...Or just make a shooter.
Focusing only on specific parts is not bad, if a game can make those parts really great instead of all standard parts average I don't see any problem.
If a game put most or all of it's resources on one or 2 types of gameplay it can really make those good. And balancing is easier as well. Not all games need to have everything. I for one would love a game focused on exploration with little or no dungeons and raids and all that content put in the open world instead. If I want to do dungeons I can pick up something else.
A little of everything is a terrible idea since nothing will really be great that way. In a perfect world you can do everything huge and perfect but few games have the budget fopr that today.
well if you want a large world and they make a small world that is something. Label is something other than a problem if you like. Mismatching a preference.
Kyleran: "Now there's the real trick, learning to accept and enjoy a game for what
it offers rather than pass on what might be a great playing experience
because it lacks a few features you prefer."
John Henry Newman: "A man would do nothing if he waited until he could do it so well that no one could find fault."
FreddyNoNose: "A good game needs no defense; a bad game has no defense." "Easily digested content is just as easily forgotten."
LacedOpium: "So the question that begs to be asked is, if you are not interested in
the game mechanics that define the MMORPG genre, then why are you
playing an MMORPG?"
agree totally with the article but would like to add that developers who want perssistant living worlds need to start designing their games to have higher play rates by the same characters you dont build thriving communites by having 2000 players log in only 2 hours a day or less that means those worlds lack those characters 92 % of the time. You need to build a world where charactesr are playing 5+ hours a day commonly so people have time to bump into eachother and remember eachother this would let the # of unique characters in a community be a lot less but a lot more effective and noticeable so it will feel like more with less. older games were designed to be more time syncish so in effect we have been hit with a double wammy games having less time per unique char spent in them + having larger #s of unique chars supported through instancing and cross server technologies.
Its not so much about how many people are stuffed into the gameworld, its how many freaking instances do I need to load through to move around the game world. THAT'S what we are really talking about when discussing world size.
Instancing breaks immersion not the number of people running around next to you at once or how many of them you can realistically say hi to.
The other problem with instancing is channels, Im here, your here, but wait I cant see you. Another nail in the coffin for a large persistent world.
Oh there are no more resources left in this "version" of the world let me just switch instances...... Thats not my idea of an MMO.
Its just silly to say since you cant possible communicate with everyone in the world at once, they dont need to be there period, section everyone off into their own smaller containers. That's now just a multiplayer game, not one large breathing persistent world.
I would say this genre is inspiring the creation of new genres that have yet to be named. Smaller Multiplayer Online Game? I'm kidding of course but you start to see games with mmo elements that I'm not even sure what to call them other than dayz being a survival game and more survival type of games have been coming out these past few years.
I'll call destiny a FPS-PG, First person shooter progression game, yes you can argue CoD is progression too cause of those levels but the clear defined progression of gear etc.
I'm not sure I would say we are/will see smaller mmos but you can call it whatever you like. I say the genre is adapting creating new genres.
The acronym MMORPG use to mean Massive Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game.
But the acronym MMMORPG now currently means Microscopic Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game. Kappa.
I would say this genre is inspiring the creation of new genres that have yet to be named. Smaller Multiplayer Online Game?
SMOG... I like it!
"Social media gives legions of idiots the right to speak when they once only spoke at a bar after a glass of wine, without harming the community ... but now they have the same right to speak as a Nobel Prize winner. It's the invasion of the idiots”
― Umberto Eco
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?” ― CD PROJEKT RED
Making them smaller just makes attrition and retention more impossible to manage. What needs to be done is to provide more support for those smaller social groups that people form.
I was going to post this in reply to that article but... meh, I like this place better:
Shokrizade’s reply to that article was spot on. In order to
build that social network - establish that community within the community – there
needs to be a much larger pool for the players to draw from. A pool large
enough for players to find enough like-minded or similarly-interested individuals
to gravitate toward. But that brings in the other part of the equation which is
providing the tools for that to happen.
I used to manage a site called LOTROVault, and one of the
features we created was a Kinship (guild) Finder. Kinship leaders would post
the information about the kinship and players looking to join one had several
filters to sort through the listings to find one that suits them. As we built
it, we found that there were a rather large set of criteria that people used to
find a group they wanted to join.
Aside from the obvious ones of days/time and play style
(f.ex: progression, PvP, raiding, PvE, crafting) there were several others that were equally important
-
Clan size
-
Where the guild chats/hangs (f.ex: clan forums,
TS, vent, IRC, mumble)
-
Country/Language
-
Age
Once you get into the open world games, like UO and EVE
Online, you also have the matter of zones and area of operation within the
game, as well as a broader spectrum of guild goals and supported playstyles. There
are also many guilds in MMOs built around special interests, often only tangentially
related to the game. Two of the most common are locality (f.ex.: Long Island, Quebec,
Portland, Newcastle) and military/law enforcement.
So devs seem to have the 2,000 or so server cap thing
nailed, but that second part of helping the smaller groups form – the most
important part – is often noticeably absent.
Smaller worlds won’t help. Smaller server caps won't help. Better tools would. Specifically, tools that let
people interact and communicate in ways that they normally do in real life. Those are
key to allowing the lasting friendships and tight communities within a game
world to form and grow.
-- Whammy - a 64x64 miniRPG - RPG Quiz - can you get all 25 right? - FPS Quiz - how well do you know your shooters?
My first thought was that they have been dropping for years. In AC we would have thousands of players per night but you would really only associate with a few of them at any given time... Then as tech changed and habits changed... So I look at these forums and I see the usual response or two by the mmorpg staff in the beginning and then they have since moved on -- such as the gaming industry. So much to do, so much to play, so many other things interject. They begin a conversation then quickly drop it for the next. Sound anything like the gaming habits of todays players?
Less statistics and metrics please. MMO's need to go back to what they were.
Virtual worlds where you can live out your alternate reality dream.
All I see these days is developers and publishers convincing the market that they are wrong for wanting massive persistent worlds. Instead of looking into real solutions they hide behind market reports to justify the mistakes on their end.
Sometimes I think its better for the MMO genre to go back to its niche origins. In the old days I could meet new friends in game. These days nobody cares about another player, times changed but so did the games. Game design is very relevant to how players treat other players.
Instancing and even smaller worlds wont make players magically like strangers.
Don't know where the OP read that Pantheon will be a small mmo, think they make it up as soon they go along. Dark And Light will be 40.000 square kilometers so perhaps the op needs to do a bit of research. Yes mmo have got smaller but the days of large mmo's are not over.
Vanguard was the last truely massive scale mmo and AA and BDO are not small mmo's.
I would say this genre is inspiring the creation of new genres that have yet to be named. Smaller Multiplayer Online Game?
SMOG... I like it!
Ironically, the "SMOG" would be more of a successor to the MUD than the bigger mmorpgs have been. Maybe this is where things are heading. Minecraft, ARK, DayZ, etc. Are all popular and successful games, although it could be argued DayZ was more popular as a mod than the standalone (maybe). Each game is more or less focused on small group multiplayer experiences.
Additionally, if developers started to think more along these lines, as opposed to the larger scale mmos, perhaps we would see more interesting ideas take shape. Even more IPs coming to virtual worlds. It might work better for content creation as well. Would it theoretically be easier for a dev team to make adventure modules designed for smaller group games, as opposed to a patch cycle with a raid, dungeon, and supplemental quests? The hard part just might be making the toolset to support content module creation. After the toolset is in place, couldn't you then plug in parameters and have the thing mostly design itself? That level of automation, no doubt, has potential for some substantial flaws, but perhaps no one has really tried to do something like that.
Given the proper toolset, we might see something more like a virtual tabletop experience, that doesn't feel like a tabletop game, but more like an actual videogame.
I dunno, it's 5am, so maybe I am just rambling on.
I can't speak for this very minute or new xpack but last time i played Wow it was DEAD.
I counted easily because well i saw a total of 7 players in an entire week,only 6 were actually playing,1 was passing through asking for new guild members.
Then many instances are exploited by multiple boxers,some players running 5+ players.This also means cheating since you could never actually play 5+ players to run an instance.Justin TV ,a place that used to be super popular had an entire room just for Wow multi boxers running instances.
Even so,the "outside world" is NOT a MMO,it is designed to SOLO,so in essence 100% exactly the same as playing any single player game.
As far as size goes,i look for quality more so than size.like if i don't like a NPC with a yellow marker over it's head asking me to play a game designed to NOT be linear,in a linear fashion,why would i care if it had 2500 more of the same?
Me personally,i couldn't care less if a game is big or small all i want is that quality.HOWEVER if you are asking me for more and more money,you had better give me more than just more of the same old because now you are using an already made engine,already made mechanics/tools/textures etc etc and that takes a LOT less effort and cost to produce.In other words ,i don't take kindly to a developer trying to LEECH money from exploitable naive fanbois gamer's.
\
That is a major problem with gaming,devs see that once a game or brand becomes popular,they can pretty much sell anything after that.We can again look at the giant,no matter how many players complained of past expacks,they kept buying them and kept playing.How often have we heard "we want vanilla back"....MANY times,yet they keep buying and keep coming back.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
I don't see how a "smaller" MMO can exist. Either it's Massively Multiplayer or it isn't, in which case it's just multiplayer. EQ was Massively Multiplayer, Battlefield was multiplayer.
Today something like Planetside 2 is Massively Multiplayer, World of Tanks is multiplayer (despite it's claim as a tank "MMO").
If someone makes a "smaller" online game then it's not an MMO it's just Multiplayer. Why the confusion?
I honestly think that devs have realized massive numbers in one game world holds no novelty any longer. It adds nothing worthwhile to a game. Especially in terms of RPG. It's just a headache in the end, it requires too much sacrifice on the game-play front. It's best to focus on a core element with lots of game-play revolving around it. Be it survival games, dungeon running, or whatever else you can dream up.... Massive just leads to a repetitive experience, be it massive player numbers or world size. Hence the life story of the MMORPG...
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
I don't see how a "smaller" MMO can exist. Either it's Massively Multiplayer or it isn't, in which case it's just multiplayer. EQ was Massively Multiplayer, Battlefield was multiplayer.
Today something like Planetside 2 is Massively Multiplayer, World of Tanks is multiplayer (despite it's claim as a tank "MMO").
If someone makes a "smaller" online game then it's not an MMO it's just Multiplayer. Why the confusion?
well world of tanks is massively as you will see 15000 connected to the server.
Kyleran: "Now there's the real trick, learning to accept and enjoy a game for what
it offers rather than pass on what might be a great playing experience
because it lacks a few features you prefer."
John Henry Newman: "A man would do nothing if he waited until he could do it so well that no one could find fault."
FreddyNoNose: "A good game needs no defense; a bad game has no defense." "Easily digested content is just as easily forgotten."
LacedOpium: "So the question that begs to be asked is, if you are not interested in
the game mechanics that define the MMORPG genre, then why are you
playing an MMORPG?"
I don't see how a "smaller" MMO can exist. Either it's Massively Multiplayer or it isn't, in which case it's just multiplayer. EQ was Massively Multiplayer, Battlefield was multiplayer.
Today something like Planetside 2 is Massively Multiplayer, World of Tanks is multiplayer (despite it's claim as a tank "MMO").
If someone makes a "smaller" online game then it's not an MMO it's just Multiplayer. Why the confusion?
well world of tanks is massively as you will see 15000 connected to the server.
Yeah, that's not what defines massively, it's how many can you interact with during your playing session.
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
I don't see how a "smaller" MMO can exist. Either it's Massively Multiplayer or it isn't, in which case it's just multiplayer. EQ was Massively Multiplayer, Battlefield was multiplayer.
Today something like Planetside 2 is Massively Multiplayer, World of Tanks is multiplayer (despite it's claim as a tank "MMO").
If someone makes a "smaller" online game then it's not an MMO it's just Multiplayer. Why the confusion?
well world of tanks is massively as you will see 15000 connected to the server.
And you see 15 vs 15 on a map, the rest are just in a glorified chat room or in another 15 vs 15 map. That's not an MMO.
You're mistaking Massive, as in a lot of players, with Massively Multiplayer, which uses Massively as an adjective to describe the large numbers of Multiplayer players interacting in the game. The two words are connected, one being descriptive of the other.
It's the difference between 15 million people playing an FPS making it massive but the matches are 10 v 10, and several hundred players on the same map, making it Massively Multiplayer.
Comments
So does Boundless, also a different design into connecting it all together into a proper MMO. All of these ideas still in development but we'll see.
well if you want a large world and they make a small world that is something. Label is something other than a problem if you like. Mismatching a preference.
Epic Music: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vAigCvelkhQ&list=PLo9FRw1AkDuQLEz7Gvvaz3ideB2NpFtT1
https://archive.org/details/softwarelibrary_msdos?&sort=-downloads&page=1
Kyleran: "Now there's the real trick, learning to accept and enjoy a game for what it offers rather than pass on what might be a great playing experience because it lacks a few features you prefer."
John Henry Newman: "A man would do nothing if he waited until he could do it so well that no one could find fault."
FreddyNoNose: "A good game needs no defense; a bad game has no defense." "Easily digested content is just as easily forgotten."
LacedOpium: "So the question that begs to be asked is, if you are not interested in the game mechanics that define the MMORPG genre, then why are you playing an MMORPG?"
Instancing breaks immersion not the number of people running around next to you at once or how many of them you can realistically say hi to.
The other problem with instancing is channels, Im here, your here, but wait I cant see you. Another nail in the coffin for a large persistent world.
Oh there are no more resources left in this "version" of the world let me just switch instances...... Thats not my idea of an MMO.
Its just silly to say since you cant possible communicate with everyone in the world at once, they dont need to be there period, section everyone off into their own smaller containers. That's now just a multiplayer game, not one large breathing persistent world.
I'll call destiny a FPS-PG, First person shooter progression game, yes you can argue CoD is progression too cause of those levels but the clear defined progression of gear etc.
I'm not sure I would say we are/will see smaller mmos but you can call it whatever you like. I say the genre is adapting creating new genres.
But the acronym MMMORPG now currently means Microscopic Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game. Kappa.
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?”
― CD PROJEKT RED
Here's something I wrote a while ago on exactly that topic:
http://themess.com/gaming/game-dev-blog/virtual-worlds-for-real-life-people-part-1/
- RPG Quiz - can you get all 25 right?
- FPS Quiz - how well do you know your shooters?
Shokrizade’s reply to that article was spot on. In order to build that social network - establish that community within the community – there needs to be a much larger pool for the players to draw from. A pool large enough for players to find enough like-minded or similarly-interested individuals to gravitate toward. But that brings in the other part of the equation which is providing the tools for that to happen.
I used to manage a site called LOTROVault, and one of the features we created was a Kinship (guild) Finder. Kinship leaders would post the information about the kinship and players looking to join one had several filters to sort through the listings to find one that suits them. As we built it, we found that there were a rather large set of criteria that people used to find a group they wanted to join.
Aside from the obvious ones of days/time and play style (f.ex: progression, PvP, raiding, PvE, crafting) there were several others that were equally important
Once you get into the open world games, like UO and EVE Online, you also have the matter of zones and area of operation within the game, as well as a broader spectrum of guild goals and supported playstyles. There are also many guilds in MMOs built around special interests, often only tangentially related to the game. Two of the most common are locality (f.ex.: Long Island, Quebec, Portland, Newcastle) and military/law enforcement.
So devs seem to have the 2,000 or so server cap thing nailed, but that second part of helping the smaller groups form – the most important part – is often noticeably absent.
Smaller worlds won’t help. Smaller server caps won't help. Better tools would. Specifically, tools that let people interact and communicate in ways that they normally do in real life. Those are key to allowing the lasting friendships and tight communities within a game world to form and grow.
- RPG Quiz - can you get all 25 right?
- FPS Quiz - how well do you know your shooters?
Couldnt have put it better myself.
Vanguard was the last truely massive scale mmo and AA and BDO are not small mmo's.
Ironically, the "SMOG" would be more of a successor to the MUD than the bigger mmorpgs have been. Maybe this is where things are heading. Minecraft, ARK, DayZ, etc. Are all popular and successful games, although it could be argued DayZ was more popular as a mod than the standalone (maybe). Each game is more or less focused on small group multiplayer experiences.
Additionally, if developers started to think more along these lines, as opposed to the larger scale mmos, perhaps we would see more interesting ideas take shape. Even more IPs coming to virtual worlds. It might work better for content creation as well. Would it theoretically be easier for a dev team to make adventure modules designed for smaller group games, as opposed to a patch cycle with a raid, dungeon, and supplemental quests? The hard part just might be making the toolset to support content module creation. After the toolset is in place, couldn't you then plug in parameters and have the thing mostly design itself? That level of automation, no doubt, has potential for some substantial flaws, but perhaps no one has really tried to do something like that.
Given the proper toolset, we might see something more like a virtual tabletop experience, that doesn't feel like a tabletop game, but more like an actual videogame.
I dunno, it's 5am, so maybe I am just rambling on.
I counted easily because well i saw a total of 7 players in an entire week,only 6 were actually playing,1 was passing through asking for new guild members.
Then many instances are exploited by multiple boxers,some players running 5+ players.This also means cheating since you could never actually play 5+ players to run an instance.Justin TV ,a place that used to be super popular had an entire room just for Wow multi boxers running instances.
Even so,the "outside world" is NOT a MMO,it is designed to SOLO,so in essence 100% exactly the same as playing any single player game.
As far as size goes,i look for quality more so than size.like if i don't like a NPC with a yellow marker over it's head asking me to play a game designed to NOT be linear,in a linear fashion,why would i care if it had 2500 more of the same?
Me personally,i couldn't care less if a game is big or small all i want is that quality.HOWEVER if you are asking me for more and more money,you had better give me more than just more of the same old because now you are using an already made engine,already made mechanics/tools/textures etc etc and that takes a LOT less effort and cost to produce.In other words ,i don't take kindly to a developer trying to LEECH money from exploitable naive fanbois gamer's.
\
That is a major problem with gaming,devs see that once a game or brand becomes popular,they can pretty much sell anything after that.We can again look at the giant,no matter how many players complained of past expacks,they kept buying them and kept playing.How often have we heard "we want vanilla back"....MANY times,yet they keep buying and keep coming back.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
Today something like Planetside 2 is Massively Multiplayer, World of Tanks is multiplayer (despite it's claim as a tank "MMO").
If someone makes a "smaller" online game then it's not an MMO it's just Multiplayer. Why the confusion?
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
well world of tanks is massively as you will see 15000 connected to the server.
Epic Music: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vAigCvelkhQ&list=PLo9FRw1AkDuQLEz7Gvvaz3ideB2NpFtT1
https://archive.org/details/softwarelibrary_msdos?&sort=-downloads&page=1
Kyleran: "Now there's the real trick, learning to accept and enjoy a game for what it offers rather than pass on what might be a great playing experience because it lacks a few features you prefer."
John Henry Newman: "A man would do nothing if he waited until he could do it so well that no one could find fault."
FreddyNoNose: "A good game needs no defense; a bad game has no defense." "Easily digested content is just as easily forgotten."
LacedOpium: "So the question that begs to be asked is, if you are not interested in the game mechanics that define the MMORPG genre, then why are you playing an MMORPG?"
In my book anything under 500 doesn't cut it.
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
"I need to finish" - Christian Wolff: The Accountant
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
And you see 15 vs 15 on a map, the rest are just in a glorified chat room or in another 15 vs 15 map. That's not an MMO.
You're mistaking Massive, as in a lot of players, with Massively Multiplayer, which uses Massively as an adjective to describe the large numbers of Multiplayer players interacting in the game. The two words are connected, one being descriptive of the other.
It's the difference between 15 million people playing an FPS making it massive but the matches are 10 v 10, and several hundred players on the same map, making it Massively Multiplayer.
Context is everything.