Honestly I think it's a complete crapshoot. There are directors of past successful titles that never replicate their success. Having a director with a thick resume doesn't guarantee the project will succeed. This is because the director cannot simply build the same game and be successful. People will see it for what it is: a mailed-in copy/paste effort. They have to build something new, but that also catches the same lightning in a bottle as their previous effort. That's a tall order. I'm not aware of any one person in the industry that has the Midas touch of every project they work on is a smash hit.
I would like to see Raph Koster build another Star Wars Galaxies type of MMO. The game had so much promise. Excellent harvesting and crafting ans actual social classes (Entertainer, Trader etc.) I would stay away from any game that John Smedley touched.
I would like to see Raph Koster build another Star Wars Galaxies type of MMO. The game had so much promise. Excellent harvesting and crafting ans actual social classes (Entertainer, Trader etc.) I would stay away from any game that John Smedley touched.
I wonder if after all this time if he'd do things "the same" or if he would change things so significantly that they would be too far removed for you to enjoy?
Like Skyrim? Need more content? Try my Skyrim mod "Godfred's Tomb."
I would like to see Raph Koster build another Star Wars Galaxies type of MMO. The game had so much promise. Excellent harvesting and crafting ans actual social classes (Entertainer, Trader etc.) I would stay away from any game that John Smedley touched.
I wonder if after all this time if he'd do things "the same" or if he would change things so significantly that they would be too far removed for you to enjoy?
The only thing he is doing is doing is in a galaxy far, far away from that MMO.
I would like to see Raph Koster build another Star Wars Galaxies type of MMO. The game had so much promise. Excellent harvesting and crafting ans actual social classes (Entertainer, Trader etc.) I would stay away from any game that John Smedley touched.
Galaxies of Eden might produce a very SWG-like sandbox experience, if it ever takes off. They've been pretty quiet the past few months, which may indicate trouble with the project getting its legs under it.
I hope so, because I'd like a new SWG style MMORPG myself. Until then, though, I make do with the private server offerings.
I would like to see Raph Koster build another Star Wars Galaxies type of MMO. The game had so much promise. Excellent harvesting and crafting ans actual social classes (Entertainer, Trader etc.) I would stay away from any game that John Smedley touched.
Galaxies of Eden might produce a very SWG-like sandbox experience, if it ever takes off. They've been pretty quiet the past few months, which may indicate trouble with the project getting its legs under it.
I hope so, because I'd like a new SWG style MMORPG myself. Until then, though, I make do with the private server offerings.
I think it's hard just to get a SWG style experience.
I think that game hit with the right IP and the right world at the right time. Now we just get worse versions that never attempt to move the needle.
We all want a new SWG experience, but after hundreds of games... many promising exactly that... we got nothing that comes close aside from the emulated versions.
I would like to see Raph Koster build another Star Wars Galaxies type of MMO. The game had so much promise. Excellent harvesting and crafting ans actual social classes (Entertainer, Trader etc.) I would stay away from any game that John Smedley touched.
Galaxies of Eden might produce a very SWG-like sandbox experience, if it ever takes off. They've been pretty quiet the past few months, which may indicate trouble with the project getting its legs under it.
I hope so, because I'd like a new SWG style MMORPG myself. Until then, though, I make do with the private server offerings.
I think it's hard just to get a SWG style experience.
I think that game hit with the right IP and the right world at the right time. Now we just get worse versions that never attempt to move the needle.
We all want a new SWG experience, but after hundreds of games... many promising exactly that... we got nothing that comes close aside from the emulated versions.
This is a game truly built to be a spiritual successor. Entertainers and musicians, architects, etc.
It's SWG 2 without the licensing deal, based on what's been revealed so far. Even the dev team isn't shy about stating many of their systems were based on or inspired by the SWG systems.
That part actually scares me a bit, because they should be evolving those parts where possible. SWG isn't perfect- for example, a lot of work could be done to make playing an entertainer day to day far more fun. Most level these toons and run afk macros while they play their combat or other crafting toons. GoE should be building on that, looking for day to day activities that make actually playing your entertainer fun and rewarding, as opposed to turning them into glorified NPC credit machines. Group missions for entertainers to group up and play "gigs" at cantinas across the galaxy, for example, where the entertainers have to play to crowd cues and are rewarded based on how many NPC and PC dancers/listeners they get out on the floor. Things like that.
I'm hoping they're spending a *lot* of time brainstorming around how to take SWG and move it forward, instead of merely trying to copy it with a generic sci-fi setting and a 64 bit client.
With that said: I wish I could put together a kickstarter to coalesce the SWG Legends/Restoration3/Sunrunner2 teams. The Legends team has a great eye for QoL improvements that don't break game systems (i.e. double-clicking a starport automatically travels to that starport in the galaxy map menu, etc.), Restoration 3 seems to have a dev team dedicated to recreating a game that feels timeline appropriate (and retains the skill system freedom SWG was known for pre-NGE), and Sunrunner 2 has added an incredibly impressive list of features, including building out new planets, expanding Kashyyk, etc..
All three teams have shown an eye for adding and expanding the game. If they combined resources, it would be a truly definitive version of SWG.
I would like to see Raph Koster build another Star Wars Galaxies type of MMO. The game had so much promise. Excellent harvesting and crafting ans actual social classes (Entertainer, Trader etc.) I would stay away from any game that John Smedley touched.
Galaxies of Eden might produce a very SWG-like sandbox experience, if it ever takes off. They've been pretty quiet the past few months, which may indicate trouble with the project getting its legs under it.
I hope so, because I'd like a new SWG style MMORPG myself. Until then, though, I make do with the private server offerings.
I think it's hard just to get a SWG style experience.
I think that game hit with the right IP and the right world at the right time. Now we just get worse versions that never attempt to move the needle.
We all want a new SWG experience, but after hundreds of games... many promising exactly that... we got nothing that comes close aside from the emulated versions.
This is a game truly built to be a spiritual successor. Entertainers and musicians, architects, etc.
It's SWG 2 without the licensing deal, based on what's been revealed so far. Even the dev team isn't shy about stating many of their systems were based on or inspired by the SWG systems.
That part actually scares me a bit, because they should be evolving those parts where possible. SWG isn't perfect- for example, a lot of work could be done to make playing an entertainer day to day far more fun. Most level these toons and run afk macros while they play their combat or other crafting toons. GoE should be building on that, looking for day to day activities that make actually playing your entertainer fun and rewarding, as opposed to turning them into glorified NPC credit machines. Group missions for entertainers to group up and play "gigs" at cantinas across the galaxy, for example, where the entertainers have to play to crowd cues and are rewarded based on how many NPC and PC dancers/listeners they get out on the floor. Things like that.
I'm hoping they're spending a *lot* of time brainstorming around how to take SWG and move it forward, instead of merely trying to copy it with a generic sci-fi setting and a 64 bit client. <snip>
It seems another developer is hedging their bets by not pushing themselves, emulating and copying another games design decisions without improving them. That's the all encompassing business decision these days. I'm with you, I hope they push all the boundaries they can. Without that idea of moving things forward, the genre doesn't evolve.
Galaxies of Eden added to the wish list, thanks to this discussion.
Logic, my dear, merely enables one to be wrong with great authority.
I would like to see Raph Koster build another Star Wars Galaxies type of MMO. The game had so much promise. Excellent harvesting and crafting ans actual social classes (Entertainer, Trader etc.) I would stay away from any game that John Smedley touched.
I admit that Raph Koster has some skills and deserves to be on a dev team. But he is horrible as the one making the final decisions.
In UO he said he put in like 19 patch fixes to try and fix Griefing and couldn't fix it. Griefing was totally running rampant while he was lead dev, people stealing house keys, stealing everything from peoples houses, people porting people onto boxes then killing them and taking their stuff, people killing newbs at the city gates. Griefing pretty much killed UO.
How completely out of touch do you have to be to put in 19 patch fixes and still not fix the problem. As soon as he left someone else created Trammel and instantly fixed it. Yet even just a few years ago he said he would like another shot at trying to fix griefing without Trammel. His weak decision making completely ruined UO for so many people due to griefing. Trammel fixed the problem yet he still cant even recognize that. If that would have been instituted on the the first patch, then UO would have been the top game for years. Devs could have been moving on to more important thing instead of focusing on 19 patch fixes to stop Griefing.
Pretty obvious separate servers for PVE and PVP was necessary and simple solution.
I have no confidence he can make any tough decision for the health of a game. Stick him on crafting or something but keep him away from the big decisions.
Look at Richard Garriott, he made Ultima Online and everything else he's done has sucked monkey.
Look at Brad McQuaid, he made EverQuest and everything else he did sucked monkey.
Look at Mark Jacobs, he made Dark Age of Camelot and everything else he's done has sucked monkey.
Naoki Yoshida's turn on the monkey is coming.
Yoshi P has done it the other way round. Taking a 'sucked monkey' as you call it, and making it into one of the most popular mmo's out there. This is probably one of the most important lessons for any game developer - look at the mistakes, learn from them, change them.
My concern wouldn't be about the quality, rather the targeted player base. His reputation has grown so much with ffxiv that any new mmo with his name would draw the immediate attention of ffxiv fans. Would it then just be robbing Peter to pay Paul rather than growing the genre?
I feel like every successful mmo lead from the past has followed up with complete failures later on.
This is basically true of every creative in every field ever.
That's an interesting perspective.
Well, here's how I think of it, as someone who has been making games professionally for nearly 30 years now.
First, no matter how talented or skilled the creator, they probably got lucky at some point. The question is whether they analyzed their luck to see what worked and what didn't and were able to build on it in the future. If they don't, then they just keep trying the same formula and it doesn't go anywhere. We see people complaining about that pattern in this very thread.
But then there's the question of growth. It involves pushing past what you know. And that means making all sorts of new mistakes. If you don't do that, you don't get better. Many of the new things you try won't pan out. Sometimes you might be right about the future but the audience may not be willing to follow you (there is a long history of this, with many famous examples coming from the history of music -- everything from riots at classical music concerts that were too adventurous to Dylan going electric).
If you see someone you think of as a creative who knows what they are doing, and they DON'T surprise you with something they do, or DON'T try new things and occasionally push at the boundaries... they are probably not stretching.
Lastly, I frequently read things that I personally think are just complete BS:
- "they haven't done anything that hit/I liked/I heard of lately so they're washed up" -- I hear this all the time, and it really bugs me. There are SO MANY REASONS why this might happen.
It might mean they are doing things you don't care about, but that others value.
It might mean they just don't care about popularity anymore because they have a muse to chase.
It might be they want to keep mining a vein that just isn't the mainstream anymore, too; so they might be doing great stuff, but it never hits the media or social or whatever.
It might just be that, like creatives in every industry whether it's games or music or books or anything, that they just aren't able to get their work out there because of stupid business reasons. It happens all the time -- most games that start development never ship!
In MMOs in particular, you have to realize how vanishingly rare it is to even get to make one. Most developers get one chance, ever.
- "a great creative always has hits" -- yeah right, it's just a silly thought. Even someone like Spielberg has 1942 and Always. *Everyone* has major and minor works.
And plenty of great creatives don't have hits at all ever, because popularity and quality do not have a particularly strong relationship (just check the Top 40 for ANY moment in history to verify this fact; but it's backed up by research too).
Lastly... there's just the taste question. The audience's tastes evolve. So do the creator's. Getting a moment of matching up is basically magic, and back to lucky timing again.
BTW, I do feel flattered that a few people mentioned me in this thread.
I wonder if after all this time if he'd do things "the same" or if he
would change things so significantly that they would be too far removed
for you to enjoy?
I would change A LOT. Actually, considering I am making an MMO right now, I should say I HAVE changed a lot. (Please follow us over at Playable Worlds!)
I don't see any point in making the same game as 25 (UO) or 20 (SWG) years ago. The audience has moved on. I've moved on. Tech is better. The state of the art is better. We've all learned a lot.
In my case, it also means that the dreams we had back when are now more achievable. And I think that right now, the audience is more in step with the idea of an alternate world that you can feel immersed in, one that is not just a themepark set of rides and quest chains, than they have been in many years. So I think that it's the right time to bring back old ideas, but to do them in a modern way.
It's still going to be a game that people will say "oh, that's an evolution of his earlier games," because, well, a given creator generally has things that they bring to projects that are distinctively their way of doing things. But yeah, some radical breaks too.
People who only knew my work on LegendMUD probably would have been horrified to see that Star Wars Galaxies basically had no NPCs -- LegendMUD was HUGELY about quests and NPCs and puzzles! But for someone who played UO in between, it would look like natural progression. *shrug*
So... I am making something that has a lot of shared DNA with UO. I am making something that has a lot of shared DNA with SWG. But it also has a lot of shared DNA with LegendMUD, with Metaplace, and even with the tabletop, mobile and social games I made that probably no one here knew or cared about. Too far for you to enjoy? All I can do is hope not.
BTW, I do feel flattered that a few people mentioned me in this thread.
I wonder if after all this time if he'd do things "the same" or if he
would change things so significantly that they would be too far removed
for you to enjoy?
I would change A LOT. Actually, considering I am making an MMO right now, I should say I HAVE changed a lot. (Please follow us over at Playable Worlds!)
I don't see any point in making the same game as 25 (UO) or 20 (SWG) years ago. The audience has moved on. I've moved on. Tech is better. The state of the art is better. We've all learned a lot.
In my case, it also means that the dreams we had back when are now more achievable. And I think that right now, the audience is more in step with the idea of an alternate world that you can feel immersed in, one that is not just a themepark set of rides and quest chains, than they have been in many years. So I think that it's the right time to bring back old ideas, but to do them in a modern way.
It's still going to be a game that people will say "oh, that's an evolution of his earlier games," because, well, a given creator generally has things that they bring to projects that are distinctively their way of doing things. But yeah, some radical breaks too.
People who only knew my work on LegendMUD probably would have been horrified to see that Star Wars Galaxies basically had no NPCs -- LegendMUD was HUGELY about quests and NPCs and puzzles! But for someone who played UO in between, it would look like natural progression. *shrug*
So... I am making something that has a lot of shared DNA with UO. I am making something that has a lot of shared DNA with SWG. But it also has a lot of shared DNA with LegendMUD, with Metaplace, and even with the tabletop, mobile and social games I made that probably no one here knew or cared about. Too far for you to enjoy? All I can do is hope not.
I think the wall that you won't jump over is that we have seen too many older creators of great MMOs go on to make dodgy follow ups. But I see both sides, those who look to old glories too much and those who dismiss them as being somewhat on the wrong foot. Wait for the reviews and 'call it' then makes more sense to me.
On a more general note, we can't expect people not to change, game designers included, they should not feel bound to reliving old glories in new works. But just like any artist, indeed any writer or other walk of life your latest work is always going to be compared to your "best", there is no getting away from that. Apart from making it your new "best" and good luck with that!
MMORPGs are just too long term a commitment for many developers. I have been approached twice in the last couple of years alone to join a team and I see no ROI for my time to do so. What we need to focus on is development for engines and A.I. The real push for the genre needs to be in the tools used to create one. Not just a focus on who makes it.
So far it seems to me that proprietary has won out over genre development nearly every time. When studios do seem to be using a licensed or free engine, they seem to be ones from five or even fifteen years ago! Now obviously some are being updated, but it does raise a question mark. Also the number of MMOs which slow down launch to upgrade from an older version of the engine to the newer, shows how long these projects are taking.
Richard Garriott. A modern version of Odyssey or Tabula Rasa. Who wouldn't play that. If you pretend Shroud of the Avator and Iron and Magic never happened then it could be ok. Maybe.
Comments
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
I hope so, because I'd like a new SWG style MMORPG myself. Until then, though, I make do with the private server offerings.
I think that game hit with the right IP and the right world at the right time. Now we just get worse versions that never attempt to move the needle.
We all want a new SWG experience, but after hundreds of games... many promising exactly that... we got nothing that comes close aside from the emulated versions.
It's SWG 2 without the licensing deal, based on what's been revealed so far. Even the dev team isn't shy about stating many of their systems were based on or inspired by the SWG systems.
That part actually scares me a bit, because they should be evolving those parts where possible. SWG isn't perfect- for example, a lot of work could be done to make playing an entertainer day to day far more fun. Most level these toons and run afk macros while they play their combat or other crafting toons. GoE should be building on that, looking for day to day activities that make actually playing your entertainer fun and rewarding, as opposed to turning them into glorified NPC credit machines. Group missions for entertainers to group up and play "gigs" at cantinas across the galaxy, for example, where the entertainers have to play to crowd cues and are rewarded based on how many NPC and PC dancers/listeners they get out on the floor. Things like that.
I'm hoping they're spending a *lot* of time brainstorming around how to take SWG and move it forward, instead of merely trying to copy it with a generic sci-fi setting and a 64 bit client.
With that said: I wish I could put together a kickstarter to coalesce the SWG Legends/Restoration3/Sunrunner2 teams. The Legends team has a great eye for QoL improvements that don't break game systems (i.e. double-clicking a starport automatically travels to that starport in the galaxy map menu, etc.), Restoration 3 seems to have a dev team dedicated to recreating a game that feels timeline appropriate (and retains the skill system freedom SWG was known for pre-NGE), and Sunrunner 2 has added an incredibly impressive list of features, including building out new planets, expanding Kashyyk, etc..
All three teams have shown an eye for adding and expanding the game. If they combined resources, it would be a truly definitive version of SWG.
Logic, my dear, merely enables one to be wrong with great authority.
In UO he said he put in like 19 patch fixes to try and fix Griefing and couldn't fix it. Griefing was totally running rampant while he was lead dev, people stealing house keys, stealing everything from peoples houses, people porting people onto boxes then killing them and taking their stuff, people killing newbs at the city gates. Griefing pretty much killed UO.
How completely out of touch do you have to be to put in 19 patch fixes and still not fix the problem. As soon as he left someone else created Trammel and instantly fixed it. Yet even just a few years ago he said he would like another shot at trying to fix griefing without Trammel. His weak decision making completely ruined UO for so many people due to griefing. Trammel fixed the problem yet he still cant even recognize that. If that would have been instituted on the the first patch, then UO would have been the top game for years. Devs could have been moving on to more important thing instead of focusing on 19 patch fixes to stop Griefing.
Pretty obvious separate servers for PVE and PVP was necessary and simple solution.
I have no confidence he can make any tough decision for the health of a game. Stick him on crafting or something but keep him away from the big decisions.
That's an interesting perspective.
nothing can beat the lore around this man!
and he can do all the part, capture motion, voice etc!
a great choice!
On a more general note, we can't expect people not to change, game designers included, they should not feel bound to reliving old glories in new works. But just like any artist, indeed any writer or other walk of life your latest work is always going to be compared to your "best", there is no getting away from that. Apart from making it your new "best" and good luck with that!
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