This is a problem I see too often with MMO games and wonder why more developers don't focus on fixing it. Low lvl content becomes a wasteland with very few or no players in it after a game has been out for awhile. They may as well delete the low lvl zones, especially when games are starting to offer catchup boosts with their new expansions or w/e.
I know they can't force players to go to these zones, but the issue is that they don't have a reason to. This isn't an issue in all MMO games but it is in a good portion of them. Seems like a waste of time to make all that content when it's just left by the wayside. I'd like to see future developers do something about this, but current developers could too. Make your worlds alive and not just a means to an end!
It's due to Dragonball Z style character progression where at max level you can one shot, someone who can one shot, someone who can one shot, someone who can one shot, someone who can one shot, someone who can one shot, someone who can one shot, someone who can one shot, someone who can one shot, someone who can one shot, a first level character.
Make it so a max level character is equivalent in strength to a full party of newbs and you keep all zones relevant because the group content from the starter areas is now engaging solo content for you.
Or just make it a bit more sandboxy with harder and easier content in all zones. Or preferably both.
This is a problem I see too often with MMO games and wonder why more developers don't focus on fixing it. Low lvl content becomes a wasteland with very few or no players in it after a game has been out for awhile. They may as well delete the low lvl zones, especially when games are starting to offer catchup boosts with their new expansions or w/e.
I know they can't force players to go to these zones, but the issue is that they don't have a reason to. This isn't an issue in all MMO games but it is in a good portion of them. Seems like a waste of time to make all that content when it's just left by the wayside. I'd like to see future developers do something about this, but current developers could too. Make your worlds alive and not just a means to an end!
GW2 has a solution to this, with "Dynamic Leveling" which allows even max level characters to hunt and explore low level zones and get exp, loot, and resources, as well as if they want, group and help out others in the zone and everyone gets exp and loot.
Egotism is the anesthetic that dullens the pain of stupidity, this is why when I try to beat my head against the stupidity of other people, I only hurt myself.
This is a problem I see too often with MMO games and wonder why more developers don't focus on fixing it. Low lvl content becomes a wasteland with very few or no players in it after a game has been out for awhile. They may as well delete the low lvl zones, especially when games are starting to offer catchup boosts with their new expansions or w/e.
I know they can't force players to go to these zones, but the issue is that they don't have a reason to. This isn't an issue in all MMO games but it is in a good portion of them. Seems like a waste of time to make all that content when it's just left by the wayside. I'd like to see future developers do something about this, but current developers could too. Make your worlds alive and not just a means to an end!
It's due to Dragonball Z style character progression where at max level you can one shot, someone who can one shot, someone who can one shot, someone who can one shot, someone who can one shot, someone who can one shot, someone who can one shot, someone who can one shot, someone who can one shot, someone who can one shot, a first level character.
Make it so a max level character is equivalent in strength to a full party of newbs and you keep all zones relevant because the group content from the starter areas is now engaging solo content for you.
Or just make it a bit more sandboxy with harder and easier content in all zones. Or preferably both.
While this in an MOBA, they have a Leveling System, (it was going to be PvE/PvP, but due to budget they pretty much scrapped the PvE and just made an MOBA)
Anyway, they have levels, but all the levels offer is Gear Options, not more direct power. So a level 1 can in fact kill a level 6 character.
That kind of system could also work.
Egotism is the anesthetic that dullens the pain of stupidity, this is why when I try to beat my head against the stupidity of other people, I only hurt myself.
I don't see low lvl zones being less populated as a real problem. In wow, decades since release, if you start a new character there is still people around to group with if you want to. The real issue most games have is that there isn't enough total content.
This doesn't mean that developers shouldnt do things to make the zones relevant for something, like Archeage does with housing, mixing in a few higher lvl bosses, or whatever. What they should never do is ruin progression by the absolutely HORRIBLE idea of zone level scaling. This is just a cheap cop out way to need less zones that ruins what RPG's are about.
Designing new zones relatively speaking is or should be nowadays a relatively small percentage of what it takes to make a game or expansion. Look at some of the Unreal engine terrain speed building videos, not to mention procedural world generation technologies out there.
I don't see all the less used zones as wasted at all, it's more content and more content is better. Every time I created a new toon in WOW i played through a different set of low lvl zones. More zones add replayability. It should nowadays with good world building tools take a matter of a few hours to create a new wow zone, more in a more recent graphically better game, but still not an enormous expenditure. Creating the engine and tools is the hard part, and perhaps new creatures and good animations.
Eventually maybe there will be enough good open source engines and tools out there where developers can throw games together much cheaper and better than in the past, and conentrate on adding variety and fun. It's a shame that every developer nowadays has to waste so many resources on rebuilding the wheel instead of generating content and features.
It is most definitely a problem and it is a two fold problem,the developer and the players.
Just throwing out a ball park figure based on years of playing mmorpg's and talking to lots of people, i would say 95% do not belong in a mmorpg and this is what the devs are catering to ,the larger number.
Quests are not quests,let be honest here,they are fetch me errands and nothing more but unless people complain this is what we keep getting.
The entire game world is usually ruined from the first minute of gameplay.it ends up looking like a mess of computer code ,designed to gain levels and NOT an immersive world.Full of ? and !, markers on maps,markers in the air,instead of YOU the player living in a world,you are a little child with your hand held and told what to do. End game and instances receive more attention than the world and the MMO aspect. Simple obvious ideas also ruined like food only as an out of combat idea,just dumb.Games like Wow with pets that are all near identical,just a different skin with very little difference and meaningless heals and again food OOC only...sigh,such poor game designers making these games.
Devs ignore old zones because working on them does not create more revenue but in a way it does keep players interested,perhaps all these devs bleeding players should wake up and smell the coffee. Imo their focus is to cash in on expansions/dlc's because they take so little effort compared to the main game but still charge big prices.Almost NONE of these system designers and producers deserve much credit,they are all making INDIE games not HQ games.Reason is simple>>they are businesses looking to make profits NOT to make HQ games.They aim for the lowest denominator that sells,they look at the tester games to see what is selling,then jump in on the exact same designs.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
Short solution for this problem is let players do something else aside combat .
Nope not a solution what so ever,players will still JUST play the content that gives them the best loot and wouldn't care less about anything else. Now if the conent idea is really good it will attract some attention,example Besieged from FFXI,best content idea EVER in a game and MANY players would even leave their groups to play it. However one great idea in 15_ years of game development is not going to carry the entire genre.
Besides that ,SOME brands can get away selling rubbish,Blizzard,Square Enix,LOTRO/Bethesda/zeni etc etc.if a brand is popular it can keep selling almost to the point of absolute trash then people start complaining.having said that,i believe that if FFXIV the one popular brand that received criticism was released with hand holding and by Blizzard,it still would have been big.
Point being you not only need great ideas but they need "rewards" or players won't care,like i said 95% do NOT belong in a mmorpg they are superficial gamer's looking for rewards.just look at all the top twitch games,the reward is rankings,levels ,gold,heroes,as long as players receive some kind of reward they couldn't care less how bad the game is.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
I don't see low lvl zones being less populated as a real problem. In wow, decades since release, if you start a new character there is still people around to group with if you want to. The real issue most games have is that there isn't enough total content.
This doesn't mean that developers shouldnt do things to make the zones relevant for something, like Archeage does with housing, mixing in a few higher lvl bosses, or whatever. What they should never do is ruin progression by the absolutely HORRIBLE idea of zone level scaling. This is just a cheap cop out way to need less zones that ruins what RPG's are about.
Designing new zones relatively speaking is or should be nowadays a relatively small percentage of what it takes to make a game or expansion. Look at some of the Unreal engine terrain speed building videos, not to mention procedural world generation technologies out there.
I don't see all the less used zones as wasted at all, it's more content and more content is better. Every time I created a new toon in WOW i played through a different set of low lvl zones. More zones add replayability. It should nowadays with good world building tools take a matter of a few hours to create a new wow zone, more in a more recent graphically better game, but still not an enormous expenditure. Creating the engine and tools is the hard part, and perhaps new creatures and good animations.
Eventually maybe there will be enough good open source engines and tools out there where developers can throw games together much cheaper and better than in the past, and conentrate on adding variety and fun. It's a shame that every developer nowadays has to waste so many resources on rebuilding the wheel instead of generating content and features.
To have unique games you really need to write custom code. I guess you could modify the existing engine, but sometimes that can be harder. That also creates a very generic world if you are making it in a matter of hours. I find there is too much content in MMOs so I guess I am on the opposite end of the spectrum. I can't even stomach doing the content in modern MMOs which is part of why I'm not playing them right now.
This is a problem I see too often with MMO games and wonder why more developers don't focus on fixing it. Low lvl content becomes a wasteland with very few or no players in it after a game has been out for awhile. They may as well delete the low lvl zones, especially when games are starting to offer catchup boosts with their new expansions or w/e.
I know they can't force players to go to these zones, but the issue is that they don't have a reason to. This isn't an issue in all MMO games but it is in a good portion of them. Seems like a waste of time to make all that content when it's just left by the wayside. I'd like to see future developers do something about this, but current developers could too. Make your worlds alive and not just a means to an end!
This is not a problem. This is a personal issue and it is your personal issue. I really hate when people start saying their little issues are some kind of game developer problem. BS on you.
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?"
This is a problem I see too often with MMO games and wonder why more developers don't focus on fixing it. Low lvl content becomes a wasteland with very few or no players in it after a game has been out for awhile. They may as well delete the low lvl zones, especially when games are starting to offer catchup boosts with their new expansions or w/e.
I know they can't force players to go to these zones, but the issue is that they don't have a reason to. This isn't an issue in all MMO games but it is in a good portion of them. Seems like a waste of time to make all that content when it's just left by the wayside. I'd like to see future developers do something about this, but current developers could too. Make your worlds alive and not just a means to an end!
I think it comes down to what is there that would bring veteran players to those zones? There are a few games I know of that this isn't always the case, SWG (harvesting, houses ect) GW2 (harvesting, quests and world events) Games like WoW, Aion, ESO and lots of others, once you move past those areas there is no reason to go back.
This is a problem I see too often with MMO games and wonder why more developers don't focus on fixing it. Low lvl content becomes a wasteland with very few or no players in it after a game has been out for awhile. They may as well delete the low lvl zones, especially when games are starting to offer catchup boosts with their new expansions or w/e.
I know they can't force players to go to these zones, but the issue is that they don't have a reason to. This isn't an issue in all MMO games but it is in a good portion of them. Seems like a waste of time to make all that content when it's just left by the wayside. I'd like to see future developers do something about this, but current developers could too. Make your worlds alive and not just a means to an end!
I think it comes down to what is there that would bring veteran players to those zones? There are a few games I know of that this isn't always the case, SWG (harvesting, houses ect) GW2 (harvesting, quests and world events) Games like WoW, Aion, ESO and lots of others, once you move past those areas there is no reason to go back.
With ESO scaling and set bonuses, they've alleviated a lot of that issue. However, absolutely agreed that too many leave low level zones devoid of content for those above the zone level.
I am interested in seeing how Pantheon handles this 3 or 6 months after release. What will happen when there is no one around to do halnirs cave? To get two groups together for that raid boss? Players won't stick around long.
I would blame the current trend of story driven game design. These games are like books now, once you have read the first chapter you won't go back ever again unless you read the whole book again and that won't happen anytime soon.
Scaling makes even less sense in said design style. Why go back to those starting zones, the plot has progressed far away from events that have taken place simultaneously with those you experienced at the beginning.
The only way is to narrow the gap between 0 - max, and give up the story mode design and leave it for single player games only. Zones exists for technical reasons, mainly for limited memory and loading time, but they have now become like chapters in a book in modern MMOs where you complete zone 1 before you can access to zone 2. That's how arcade shooters used to work in early 80's.
Hardly, it is the fast leveling speed that means you just spend a rather short while in mid level zones that is the problem. Of course eveb with a slow leveling speed those zones will have rather small population after a while.
It is the main reason so many games have gone over to mega servers.
Taking away the story wont help a bit. Besides using mega servers the most effective ways would be either a downleveling mechanics like GW2 or to lower the powergap a lot (and in this case you probably need to get rid of levels altogther as well).
If you just get a low increase in power as you play mid difficulty zones would become rather popular since you get better loot and a bit more challenge in them then the easy zones but things wont be as hard as in the endgame zones.
Even with very little story (like EQ or Lineage) people don't get back to grey zones except maybe to gank lowbies if you have open world PvP. There is little to no XP, loot or challenge which is the top 3 reasons for people to play into a zone. Just changing that is not nearly enough.
Now, there are other reasons why too much focus on a scripted story is a bad idea, for one thing it takes away a lot of the adventuring when you always get told where to go and what to do (that is more henchmaning, not adventuring) and removing or toning that down is not a bad thing, it just wont help in this particular case since MMOs had this problem since Meridian 59.
I am rather partial for a really low powergap and getting rid of levels. Not horizontal progression but more like staring out as a recruit and turning into elite soldier instead of starting out as a peasant and turning into a demi God.
I don't consider it a problem that needs to be fixed. Most of these games are progression simulators where you grow in power to go fight harder things with constant progression. I want to see new things instead of going back to old stuff.
Iselin: And the next person who says "but it's a business, they need to make money" can just go fuck yourself.
It's the Columbus effect. When you're out of continent.. uhh, content.
What? Columbus went back to Europe after each of his 3 journeys... It is more the "Boss effect", once you gained enough power you stay away from work that is "beneath you".
I never really gotten the fascination Yanks have for Columbus, he "discovered" a place where millions of people already lived and he was not the first European that went there either (that probably was Leif Ericsson, he did get there but it is hard to prove he was the first either).
FF11 and now FF14 have come up with the best approach to this problem IMO ...
There jobs system has the new zones and Dungeons constant
Well one person sees it,too bad other devs don't know how to do it..Old zones in FFXI were still relevant 5/6 years later.although many did start to hangout in Aht Urghan for a while.Like Wow and EQ2 they ruined the game to speed things up to get more people to buy xpacs,lame ideals behind those closed doors. i doubt i will ever again see a developer say,let's keep it real,let's quit aiming for big bucks and make a great game with longevity not just 1/2 zones for your current pleasure. When you see devs selling instant gratification,it is like they are saying "why would anyone want to play our boring game,just advance them to the new xpac".
Then we get a total dumbass like Blizzard who scales the content but not the players ..lol.So instead of allowing friends to group together,they encourage more soloing.This again was first done by i believe EQ2,allowed players to mentor down so they could group with others,then FXXI followed suit,while the rest still stand there looking dumb.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
The Problem is bad world design plus porting. Going back to eg Meridian. Around the towns were low lvl areas. The further you went out the mobs became stronger, but there were no hubs out there, so you always had to go back through the lowbie areas. Add some entrances to high lvl dungeons, high lvl mobs and resources to the lowbie areas and you will always have all kind of players crossing that zone or even playing in it.
Next thing. No need to interact. Even if so people just pass each other in seconds without interaction. Some reasons: - unlimited world/zone chat. You don't need to ask the lowbie if he has seen highlvl mob x somewhere around. - lack of long term buffs spreader through classes. So no need to stop and exchange those buffs. -power creep and ttk of mobs. High lvl. Chars running through one shooting the mobs to help the newbies. No need/chance from a newbie perspective to help a high lvl character. -quest mobs/points clearly defined at a certain location (together with maps, world chat, ...) No need to ask for directions, or if the crossing player has seen xyz. No need to ask for the way to a dungeon.
All the convenient features that let us play independently kill those interactions. Porting/fast travel leads to people never see each other except for seconds passing by and even then there is no need for chatting, buffing, helping each other.
I would love to see a world again that tries to simulate a fantasy world. Where I cannot talk to everyone if I don't know them. Where the say chat is needed. And where I give/receive/need buffs/tips/info from other players.
Make different races start at different towns and from there spread out into the world. So high lvl players from other races have to cross that zones. Give them reasons to stay there for a while and especially give us people the need to interact again
While this in an MOBA, they have a Leveling System, (it was going to be PvE/PvP, but due to budget they pretty much scrapped the PvE and just made an MOBA)
Anyway, they have levels, but all the levels offer is Gear Options, not more direct power. So a level 1 can in fact kill a level 6 character.
That kind of system could also work.
I know the logic is not your strong side, but some things are obvious - gear, levels, game skills, it does not matter, all is the same - if something allows you to gain power and advantage in solo linear manner - it is a vertical progression. If a character can beat another character because of its gear is not different from a level gap.
So lvl 1 with a good gear will beat lvl 6 with bad gear, but what about lvl 6 with a good gear?
In horizontal progression the different skills are not unquestionably better. It's like in SMITE I only had certain god's I could play as but I never really felt like "Oh if only I could unlock X god then I could truly compete!" There were people using god's I had access to doing better and worse than me so I knew it really came down to player skill in the end. Meanwhile in vertical progression games I have absolutely felt like "If I could do more than 1% of their healthbar per hit and they didn't one shot me, I could absolutely beat this guy."
Vertical progression apologists may try to sell us on this "There is no real difference" nonsense but anyone who has played a horizontal progression game, played a vertical progression game, and has two brain cells to rub together knows the difference is dramatic.
I meant that developers discover new continents to migrate to instead of dealing with what they had. It's funny as hell to look at an EverQuest or World of Warcraft map today, they span through space and time.
OK, fine, It's not the Columbus effect, it's the Stephen Hawking effect.
Ah, well you probably should have named it after Amerigo Vespucci instead then, there is a reason it is called "America" after him and not "Columbia", Columbus thought he was in India which already was discovered and that he just had found a shortcut...
I like "Hawkins effect". And yes, adding new continents and timelines is a solutions far too many devs use way too often. There are cases when you more or less need to add a new landmass since your gameworld really is full but when one consider that the zones tend to be rather small compared to actual regions it would be better to actually get the original continent to a large enough size first.
The whole timeline thing is just silly unless you have a Doctor Who MMO.
I would go for quests in low-lvl regions. Let's take Lotro as an example. Lonelands, almost empty region. But at level 105 advanced scouts report activity of GrumpyHand Orcs, camped in some secret cave. And yes, rare resource nodes started to pop up here. Or: for lvl.100 quest you need to escort 20 NPCs in same Lonelands. Another problem are developers themselves. If I create lvl.20 content, I should think about lvl.40: what would encourage players to visit lvl.20 area? If we have Rift raid, what is to keep players to raid there at lvl.85? In short, it's mostly up to lack of imagination of developers.
In horizontal progression the different skills are not unquestionably better. It's like in SMITE I only had certain god's I could play as but I never really felt like "Oh if only I could unlock X god then I could truly compete!" There were people using god's I had access to doing better and worse than me so I knew it really came down to player skill in the end. Meanwhile in vertical progression games I have absolutely felt like "If I could do more than 1% of their healthbar per hit and they didn't one shot me, I could absolutely beat this guy."
Vertical progression apologists may try to sell us on this "There is no real difference" nonsense but anyone who has played a horizontal progression game, played a vertical progression game, and has two brain cells to rub together knows the difference is dramatic.
Horizontal progression is not skill related. Take the weapons in Dark souls games, with enchanting a low grade weapon could become as powerful as a high grade, and every weapon has unique characteristics. This is a horizontal progression too, but with gear. It is possible even with the levels if for example every level gives you the option to increase only one stat. So some players will become very strong, but very slow, others will be very fast, but weak, most will be balanced. Well it will be more complicated, but anyway. So the difference is the linear increase of the power.
I have never played Dark Souls but the system you're describing sounds nothing like horizontal progression.
I'll give you two examples of actual horizontal progression games.
In MOBAs such as SMITE or LoL you start with certain playable characters and unlock more via either swiping or play. None of these characters are definitely better than others. They are different. For instance you start with Thor as an assassin in SMITE. In the hands of a good player Thor is a great assassin. Last time I played he was top tier / high in the meta and everything. I unlocked Basset and Thanatos because I liked their playstyle but people with Thor who were better than me could still totally stomp me, and I could stomp people playing Thor who were worse than me.
In Guild Wars 1 fairly early into the game you unlocked armor that had the best stats and more armor advancements were purely cosmetic. You also hit level cap halfway through the game. Up until you had the best armor, max level, and a solid set of 7 regular skills plus an elite the game was vertical progression. Past that point running around unlocking more skills was horizontal progression as you could only run a max of 8 skills with one of them being elite. The final build I was rocking people with endgame was all original skills I got during the first half of the game plus 1 elite skill because those original skills were so solid. Other people had crazy builds they unlocked endgame. Usually I was better than them because I had strong mastery over my build and it was solid.
In horizontal progression every advancement you make is matched by an equal trade off. In vertical progression advancement is not matched by equal tradeoffs. You switch from a 20 damage sword to a 50 damage sword or upgrade your 20 damage sword to a 50 damage sword. Either way if the sword you have now is straight better than your original sword and you didn't have to dump stats in other areas to do that vertical progression has happened.
So if you're saying:
"Take the weapons in Dark souls games, with enchanting a low grade weapon could become as powerful as a high grade, and every weapon has unique characteristics."
You're essentially saying "By vertically progressing my low grade weapon I can make it as good as powerful as a high grade weapon." You see the difference?
@continent topic: As far as the travelling to the new continent is seamless and there are still reasons to go back to the mainland (e.g. high lvl dungeons, quests, resources or trainers/vendors) everything is OK.
@horizontal/vertical progression: GW1 is a really good example. What you got was new skins and new skills leading to more variety in builds and appearance, but a skill you got at lvl1 was still as useful as one you got later. There was some kind of vertical progress as a +15% damage weapon was rare in pve, but +14% was easy to get.
Tbh hitting a 100hp mob with a 10 damage weapon or a 1000hp mob with a 100damage weapon where is the progression here? Its just in your mind if you talk about pve.
I think most would still be as pleasured to hunt for that different (but not better) skill, for that rare armor, or for that weapon that gives you 1% more damage, as they were in GW1 its just no one tried that again.
Talking bout the 1% more damage. Do we always have to have that power creep. Isn't it enough that with 5 levels above to do only 2-5% more damage. Do you really need that satisfaction that you can kill lowbies/lowlvl mobs with 2 hits? I think as long as I get better looking armor, some new skills and slightly better weapons (same damage but extra mods is also OK as long as they aren't op) I think the progression is still there.
But sadly as the community is now it will be: +15%damage weap or kick gtfo +14%damage losers.
Comments
Make it so a max level character is equivalent in strength to a full party of newbs and you keep all zones relevant because the group content from the starter areas is now engaging solo content for you.
Or just make it a bit more sandboxy with harder and easier content in all zones. Or preferably both.
Anyway, they have levels, but all the levels offer is Gear Options, not more direct power. So a level 1 can in fact kill a level 6 character.
That kind of system could also work.
This doesn't mean that developers shouldnt do things to make the zones relevant for something, like Archeage does with housing, mixing in a few higher lvl bosses, or whatever. What they should never do is ruin progression by the absolutely HORRIBLE idea of zone level scaling. This is just a cheap cop out way to need less zones that ruins what RPG's are about.
Designing new zones relatively speaking is or should be nowadays a relatively small percentage of what it takes to make a game or expansion. Look at some of the Unreal engine terrain speed building videos, not to mention procedural world generation technologies out there.
I don't see all the less used zones as wasted at all, it's more content and more content is better. Every time I created a new toon in WOW i played through a different set of low lvl zones. More zones add replayability. It should nowadays with good world building tools take a matter of a few hours to create a new wow zone, more in a more recent graphically better game, but still not an enormous expenditure. Creating the engine and tools is the hard part, and perhaps new creatures and good animations.
Eventually maybe there will be enough good open source engines and tools out there where developers can throw games together much cheaper and better than in the past, and conentrate on adding variety and fun. It's a shame that every developer nowadays has to waste so many resources on rebuilding the wheel instead of generating content and features.
Just throwing out a ball park figure based on years of playing mmorpg's and talking to lots of people, i would say 95% do not belong in a mmorpg and this is what the devs are catering to ,the larger number.
Quests are not quests,let be honest here,they are fetch me errands and nothing more but unless people complain this is what we keep getting.
The entire game world is usually ruined from the first minute of gameplay.it ends up looking like a mess of computer code ,designed to gain levels and NOT an immersive world.Full of ? and !, markers on maps,markers in the air,instead of YOU the player living in a world,you are a little child with your hand held and told what to do.
End game and instances receive more attention than the world and the MMO aspect.
Simple obvious ideas also ruined like food only as an out of combat idea,just dumb.Games like Wow with pets that are all near identical,just a different skin with very little difference and meaningless heals and again food OOC only...sigh,such poor game designers making these games.
Devs ignore old zones because working on them does not create more revenue but in a way it does keep players interested,perhaps all these devs bleeding players should wake up and smell the coffee.
Imo their focus is to cash in on expansions/dlc's because they take so little effort compared to the main game but still charge big prices.Almost NONE of these system designers and producers deserve much credit,they are all making INDIE games not HQ games.Reason is simple>>they are businesses looking to make profits NOT to make HQ games.They aim for the lowest denominator that sells,they look at the tester games to see what is selling,then jump in on the exact same designs.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
Now if the conent idea is really good it will attract some attention,example Besieged from FFXI,best content idea EVER in a game and MANY players would even leave their groups to play it.
However one great idea in 15_ years of game development is not going to carry the entire genre.
Besides that ,SOME brands can get away selling rubbish,Blizzard,Square Enix,LOTRO/Bethesda/zeni etc etc.if a brand is popular it can keep selling almost to the point of absolute trash then people start complaining.having said that,i believe that if FFXIV the one popular brand that received criticism was released with hand holding and by Blizzard,it still would have been big.
Point being you not only need great ideas but they need "rewards" or players won't care,like i said 95% do NOT belong in a mmorpg they are superficial gamer's looking for rewards.just look at all the top twitch games,the reward is rankings,levels ,gold,heroes,as long as players receive some kind of reward they couldn't care less how bad the game is.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
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?"
It is the main reason so many games have gone over to mega servers.
Taking away the story wont help a bit. Besides using mega servers the most effective ways would be either a downleveling mechanics like GW2 or to lower the powergap a lot (and in this case you probably need to get rid of levels altogther as well).
If you just get a low increase in power as you play mid difficulty zones would become rather popular since you get better loot and a bit more challenge in them then the easy zones but things wont be as hard as in the endgame zones.
Even with very little story (like EQ or Lineage) people don't get back to grey zones except maybe to gank lowbies if you have open world PvP. There is little to no XP, loot or challenge which is the top 3 reasons for people to play into a zone. Just changing that is not nearly enough.
Now, there are other reasons why too much focus on a scripted story is a bad idea, for one thing it takes away a lot of the adventuring when you always get told where to go and what to do (that is more henchmaning, not adventuring) and removing or toning that down is not a bad thing, it just wont help in this particular case since MMOs had this problem since Meridian 59.
I am rather partial for a really low powergap and getting rid of levels. Not horizontal progression but more like staring out as a recruit and turning into elite soldier instead of starting out as a peasant and turning into a demi God.
There jobs system has the new zones and Dungeons constant
I never really gotten the fascination Yanks have for Columbus, he "discovered" a place where millions of people already lived and he was not the first European that went there either (that probably was Leif Ericsson, he did get there but it is hard to prove he was the first either).
i doubt i will ever again see a developer say,let's keep it real,let's quit aiming for big bucks and make a great game with longevity not just 1/2 zones for your current pleasure.
When you see devs selling instant gratification,it is like they are saying "why would anyone want to play our boring game,just advance them to the new xpac".
Then we get a total dumbass like Blizzard who scales the content but not the players ..lol.So instead of allowing friends to group together,they encourage more soloing.This again was first done by i believe EQ2,allowed players to mentor down so they could group with others,then FXXI followed suit,while the rest still stand there looking dumb.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
Going back to eg Meridian. Around the towns were low lvl areas. The further you went out the mobs became stronger, but there were no hubs out there, so you always had to go back through the lowbie areas.
Add some entrances to high lvl dungeons, high lvl mobs and resources to the lowbie areas and you will always have all kind of players crossing that zone or even playing in it.
Next thing. No need to interact.
Even if so people just pass each other in seconds without interaction.
Some reasons:
- unlimited world/zone chat. You don't need to ask the lowbie if he has seen highlvl mob x somewhere around.
- lack of long term buffs spreader through classes. So no need to stop and exchange those buffs.
-power creep and ttk of mobs. High lvl. Chars running through one shooting the mobs to help the newbies. No need/chance from a newbie perspective to help a high lvl character.
-quest mobs/points clearly defined at a certain location (together with maps, world chat, ...) No need to ask for directions, or if the crossing player has seen xyz. No need to ask for the way to a dungeon.
All the convenient features that let us play independently kill those interactions. Porting/fast travel leads to people never see each other except for seconds passing by and even then there is no need for chatting, buffing, helping each other.
I would love to see a world again that tries to simulate a fantasy world. Where I cannot talk to everyone if I don't know them. Where the say chat is needed. And where I give/receive/need buffs/tips/info from other players.
Make different races start at different towns and from there spread out into the world. So high lvl players from other races have to cross that zones. Give them reasons to stay there for a while and especially give us people the need to interact again
1997 Meridian 59 'til 2019 ESO
Waiting for Camelot Unchained & Pantheon
Vertical progression apologists may try to sell us on this "There is no real difference" nonsense but anyone who has played a horizontal progression game, played a vertical progression game, and has two brain cells to rub together knows the difference is dramatic.
I like "Hawkins effect".
The whole timeline thing is just silly unless you have a Doctor Who MMO.
Let's take Lotro as an example. Lonelands, almost empty region. But at level 105 advanced scouts report activity of GrumpyHand Orcs, camped in some secret cave. And yes, rare resource nodes started to pop up here. Or: for lvl.100 quest you need to escort 20 NPCs in same Lonelands.
Another problem are developers themselves. If I create lvl.20 content, I should think about lvl.40: what would encourage players to visit lvl.20 area? If we have Rift raid, what is to keep players to raid there at lvl.85?
In short, it's mostly up to lack of imagination of developers.
http://www.mmoblogg.wordpress.com
I'll give you two examples of actual horizontal progression games.
In MOBAs such as SMITE or LoL you start with certain playable characters and unlock more via either swiping or play. None of these characters are definitely better than others. They are different. For instance you start with Thor as an assassin in SMITE. In the hands of a good player Thor is a great assassin. Last time I played he was top tier / high in the meta and everything. I unlocked Basset and Thanatos because I liked their playstyle but people with Thor who were better than me could still totally stomp me, and I could stomp people playing Thor who were worse than me.
In Guild Wars 1 fairly early into the game you unlocked armor that had the best stats and more armor advancements were purely cosmetic. You also hit level cap halfway through the game. Up until you had the best armor, max level, and a solid set of 7 regular skills plus an elite the game was vertical progression. Past that point running around unlocking more skills was horizontal progression as you could only run a max of 8 skills with one of them being elite. The final build I was rocking people with endgame was all original skills I got during the first half of the game plus 1 elite skill because those original skills were so solid. Other people had crazy builds they unlocked endgame. Usually I was better than them because I had strong mastery over my build and it was solid.
In horizontal progression every advancement you make is matched by an equal trade off. In vertical progression advancement is not matched by equal tradeoffs. You switch from a 20 damage sword to a 50 damage sword or upgrade your 20 damage sword to a 50 damage sword. Either way if the sword you have now is straight better than your original sword and you didn't have to dump stats in other areas to do that vertical progression has happened.
So if you're saying:
"Take the weapons in Dark souls games, with enchanting a low grade weapon could become as powerful as a high grade, and every weapon has unique characteristics."
You're essentially saying "By vertically progressing my low grade weapon I can make it as good as powerful as a high grade weapon." You see the difference?
@horizontal/vertical progression: GW1 is a really good example.
What you got was new skins and new skills leading to more variety in builds and appearance, but a skill you got at lvl1 was still as useful as one you got later.
There was some kind of vertical progress as a +15% damage weapon was rare in pve, but +14% was easy to get.
Tbh hitting a 100hp mob with a 10 damage weapon or a 1000hp mob with a 100damage weapon where is the progression here? Its just in your mind if you talk about pve.
I think most would still be as pleasured to hunt for that different (but not better) skill, for that rare armor, or for that weapon that gives you 1% more damage, as they were in GW1 its just no one tried that again.
Talking bout the 1% more damage. Do we always have to have that power creep. Isn't it enough that with 5 levels above to do only 2-5% more damage. Do you really need that satisfaction that you can kill lowbies/lowlvl mobs with 2 hits?
I think as long as I get better looking armor, some new skills and slightly better weapons (same damage but extra mods is also OK as long as they aren't op) I think the progression is still there.
But sadly as the community is now it will be: +15%damage weap or kick gtfo +14%damage losers.
1997 Meridian 59 'til 2019 ESO
Waiting for Camelot Unchained & Pantheon