Leveling Zones years after release become deadzones.. what a waste of resources

MMOExposed

I am getting back into some MMOs I dipped into. Trying to level my old abandoned characters.  The zones full of nice art and gameplay elements 

Is nothing but a ghost town. A Deadzone. No life anywhere besides 1 or 2 players.      
      
What an economical waste of development resources.  

I tend to see this rapid deadzoning of leveling Zones start within a month of most modern MMO releases. People progress and move on to higher level Zones and content with little to no reason to come back besides holiday events or crafting stations. 

So much wasted resources. These Zones only serve as gates for early players to level through and nothing much else. 

Why are MMOs still being designed like this? 

cameltosis

What you are talking about is a result of vertical progression, usually combined with a fairly linear questing process.

The result is always the same: after the initial rush, most players are at endgame and so the leveling zones are pretty dead. Any group content during leveling then becomes unviable, and so it gets revamped into a solo experience. We then end up with an almost 100% solo leveling experience which then jarringly switches to a group-focused endgame.

It is bad design.

Devs are still doing it this way through habit and addiction.

Ultimately, blame dungeons and dragons and other table top RPGs of the 70s and 80s. The kids who grew up playing those games went on to design the first video game RPGs and based their systems on tabletop experiences. The kids who played those early RPGs went on to design the next RPGs, and so on and so on.

DigDuggy

That's a big problem in highly structured games.   That's one of the reasons, I prefer less structured ones.  In more structured games, once you move out of a low level zone, there is rarely a need to go back.  I can't think of the exact gimmicks at the moment, but I've played games that have tried various things to make low level zones relevant, and it usually just fell kinda flat/forced.

Sovrath

cameltosis said:

What you are talking about is a result of vertical progression, usually combined with a fairly linear questing process.

The result is always the same: after the initial rush, most players are at endgame and so the leveling zones are pretty dead. Any group content during leveling then becomes unviable, and so it gets revamped into a solo experience. We then end up with an almost 100% solo leveling experience which then jarringly switches to a group-focused endgame.

It is bad design.

Devs are still doing it this way through habit and addiction.

Ultimately, blame dungeons and dragons and other table top RPGs of the 70s and 80s. The kids who grew up playing those games went on to design the first video game RPGs and based their systems on tabletop experiences. The kids who played those early RPGs went on to design the next RPGs, and so on and so on.

You can still have vertical progression and not leave behind old zones. Just make those zones important to various level groups so that players return to them.

cameltosis

Sovrath said:

cameltosis said:

What you are talking about is a result of vertical progression, usually combined with a fairly linear questing process.

The result is always the same: after the initial rush, most players are at endgame and so the leveling zones are pretty dead. Any group content during leveling then becomes unviable, and so it gets revamped into a solo experience. We then end up with an almost 100% solo leveling experience which then jarringly switches to a group-focused endgame.

It is bad design.

Devs are still doing it this way through habit and addiction.

Ultimately, blame dungeons and dragons and other table top RPGs of the 70s and 80s. The kids who grew up playing those games went on to design the first video game RPGs and based their systems on tabletop experiences. The kids who played those early RPGs went on to design the next RPGs, and so on and so on.

You can still have vertical progression and not leave behind old zones. Just make those zones important to various level groups so that players return to them.

That would require every zone to include endgame content. Thats possible, but unlikely.

And, whilst that would make each zone feel more alive and that is a good thing, it wouldn't benefit the leveling players much, they'd still struggle to find people for group content. I suppose they might get more endgamer's willing to carry them through, but that's not much fun.

Whilst we remain addicted to vertical progression and linear content, this problem will persist.

cobaltshadow

I think we find it easy to critique the dev's about the various things that "work" based on feedback the majority of gamers either helped develop or just accepted it.  I feel like one of the few systems that might make those zones more "replayable" is the scaling system.  I think SWTOR (albeit it boring, but meaningful) did okay with the scaling solution.  I don't really have a way to improve it as mmo's these days are 90% solo play, but I don't hate that either!

I feel like a huge group should sit down in a thinktank situation to reasonably come up with a better solution, otherwise they will just keep using what "works" or at most is just accepted.

Quizzical

There are two major blunders that many MMORPGs make that make this problem much worse than it has to be.

One is the separate server model of splitting players into servers.  If there are ten times as many players in zone A as in zone B, that's fine if there are ten times as many instances of zone A as zone B.  If developers insist that there must be exactly the same number of instances of each zone, then rather than having one or a few full instances of zone B, you get a large number of mostly empty instances of zone B.  Games that don't have a large enough playerbase to fill even a single copy of a zone are inevitably going to leave zone B mostly empty, but there's no excuse for having multiple instances of a zone that doesn't have enough players to fill one.

The other problem is that many games make their leveling content trivial and miserable.  The ideal model would be that new players join the game or older players create alts and go through the leveling content that way.  But many game developers go out of their way to make the leveling content dreadfully boring, so that if you're not already at the endgame, there's no sense in picking up the game at all.  They seem to think that they're trying to help players get to the endgame faster, or at least not get stuck, but trying to convince new players that your game is awful and they should quit doesn't result in more of them reaching the endgame sooner or ever.

Mendel

This is a problem created by an echo chamber environment.  First generation developers only knew tabletop games, so developed a version of those.  Subsequent generations of developers learned from the games the first generation developed.  I fully expect the next generation of developers to do the same thing.

The 'outdated content' problem was (and still is) an issue with tabletop games.  It's incredibly difficult to create content that low and max levels can both succeed at the same time without creating massive unbalance in the game.

Is there a real solution?  I don't know.  I expect it will require a completely fresh approach by (very) talented developers who are willing to challenge the paradigms developed by prior developers, and even question the tabletop elements (like progression levels, Hit Points, and others).

A few years back, I tried to engage this community with the idea of breaking away from D&D mechanics; some of you may remember it.  Tabletop gaming is all based on integer math.  Tabletops use integer math because it is easy for most people, and dice are adequate methods of randomization.  There wasn't much support to ditch the conventions created 50 years ago.  People are just too stuck on familiar ideas, and don't want to innovate.

Someone is going to have to make a major break from the past.  That will take lots of money, some brilliant individuals to rethink everything, and more support from management than other games have had.  Then the resulting product will have to be sold, hard, to players that won't recognize a new type of MMORPG when it arrives.  It will probably appear out of nowhere with little fanfare, much like MMORPGs did, or cRPGs before that, or even computer gaming in general.

cobaltshadow

I think approaching this from a FPS blended with RPG and even SandBox might be a feasible option overall.  

At the end of the day nobody wants to play a peasant forever no matter how sharp his/her/its pitchfork may be.  

Building up to the challenges is literally the ideology we are raised with in almost every country, whether it be strength, faith, or education.  That's why it appeals and remains mainstream, perhaps?

Sovrath

cameltosis said:

Sovrath said:

cameltosis said:

What you are talking about is a result of vertical progression, usually combined with a fairly linear questing process.

The result is always the same: after the initial rush, most players are at endgame and so the leveling zones are pretty dead. Any group content during leveling then becomes unviable, and so it gets revamped into a solo experience. We then end up with an almost 100% solo leveling experience which then jarringly switches to a group-focused endgame.

It is bad design.

Devs are still doing it this way through habit and addiction.

Ultimately, blame dungeons and dragons and other table top RPGs of the 70s and 80s. The kids who grew up playing those games went on to design the first video game RPGs and based their systems on tabletop experiences. The kids who played those early RPGs went on to design the next RPGs, and so on and so on.

You can still have vertical progression and not leave behind old zones. Just make those zones important to various level groups so that players return to them.

That would require every zone to include endgame content. Thats possible, but unlikely.

And, whilst that would make each zone feel more alive and that is a good thing, it wouldn't benefit the leveling players much, they'd still struggle to find people for group content. I suppose they might get more endgamer's willing to carry them through, but that's not much fun.

Whilst we remain addicted to vertical progression and linear content, this problem will persist.

I personally like vertical progression and I think that many zones should have content for various levels.

I remember being in Everquest 2 and entering a sewer level that had a door that led to higher level content. I thought that was very refreshing.

In Lineage 2 there was a swamp in the Dark Elf area that had various creature for one level but it had a higher level tree monster. It was possible to take it down with a smaller group but better with a larger group.

I'm ok with having content that's very difficult for lower level players, though possible to defeat OR that will just run over them until they attain higher levels.

However I don't thing "most" players find that fun.

Darkhawke

Strange Ultima Online solved this problem 26 years ago .. lol

cobaltshadow

Darkhawke said:

Strange Ultima Online solved this problem 26 years ago .. lol

Wasn't Ultima's primary premise PVP?  That makes a really big difference when level designing.

Darkhawke

cobaltshadow said:

Darkhawke said:

Strange Ultima Online solved this problem 26 years ago .. lol

Wasn't Ultima's primary premise PVP?  That makes a really big difference when level designing.

Well you can play in Trammel , and not have to worry about PvP at all ..

Uwakionna

Mendel said:

This is a problem created by an echo chamber environment.  First generation developers only knew tabletop games, so developed a version of those.  Subsequent generations of developers learned from the games the first generation developed.  I fully expect the next generation of developers to do the same thing.

The 'outdated content' problem was (and still is) an issue with tabletop games.  It's incredibly difficult to create content that low and max levels can both succeed at the same time without creating massive unbalance in the game.

Is there a real solution?  I don't know.  I expect it will require a completely fresh approach by (very) talented developers who are willing to challenge the paradigms developed by prior developers, and even question the tabletop elements (like progression levels, Hit Points, and others).

A few years back, I tried to engage this community with the idea of breaking away from D&D mechanics; some of you may remember it.  Tabletop gaming is all based on integer math.  Tabletops use integer math because it is easy for most people, and dice are adequate methods of randomization.  There wasn't much support to ditch the conventions created 50 years ago.  People are just too stuck on familiar ideas, and don't want to innovate.

Someone is going to have to make a major break from the past.  That will take lots of money, some brilliant individuals to rethink everything, and more support from management than other games have had.  Then the resulting product will have to be sold, hard, to players that won't recognize a new type of MMORPG when it arrives.  It will probably appear out of nowhere with little fanfare, much like MMORPGs did, or cRPGs before that, or even computer gaming in general.

I think at least in part, some might consider it an inaccurate characterization would be why.

The challenge rating of content is pretty scalable in D&D. Many tabletop games, because it allows you to extrapolate out the average level, gearing, skills, etc, allows you to find a difficulty at which your current party can approach the content. A lot of challenges are dynamically scaled by dungeon masters in that manner to tailor even prefab modules to the group they are playing with.

The thing is, this is a mechanic of tabletop that has never translated into a CRPG effectively.

It remains a holy grail of game design to have a fully autonomous "dungeon master" guiding a digital game experience with the adaptability, creativity, and reactiveness that a human DM can pull off.

What that means for computer RPGs is they have always created more rigid user experiences than tabletop can provide.

You don't need to "break from the past" if you've never even caught up to it's potential. You need to reassess game design to figure out how current systems still fail to live up to it, and how to solve that.

cameltosis

Mendel said:

This is a problem created by an echo chamber environment.  First generation developers only knew tabletop games, so developed a version of those.  Subsequent generations of developers learned from the games the first generation developed.  I fully expect the next generation of developers to do the same thing.

The 'outdated content' problem was (and still is) an issue with tabletop games.  It's incredibly difficult to create content that low and max levels can both succeed at the same time without creating massive unbalance in the game.

Is there a real solution?  I don't know.  I expect it will require a completely fresh approach by (very) talented developers who are willing to challenge the paradigms developed by prior developers, and even question the tabletop elements (like progression levels, Hit Points, and others).

Solutions already exist. They just haven't been iterated on very much, or at all really, so they're still rough and not well known.

SWG is the one that stands out to me, none of the planets ever became obsolete.

The progression mechanics meant you didn't really out-level anything, as there were no levels. All gear and buffs bought using money, not progression, so the gap between newbie and endgame was much less. Quests were procedurally generated and scaled to you and your group, providing a lot of incentive to group up regardless of power level.

Sure, my novice pikeman might not be able to hit much stuff, but with purchased gear and buffs I'll still stand my ground and the other group members won't be held back by me!

But, you only have to look at ESO's scaling, or FFXIVs job system, to see examples of other systems that bring players back to old zones. I don't really know how effective those systems are, certainly not as effective as designing your game "properly" from day 1, but at least they're trying.

For the future, CU is still the only one that excites me. Supposedly built around horizontal progression (though they've gone quiet on this for a long time now.....), players are supposed to be competitive on day 1. Progression is going to happen in a very different way to all other MMOs, not only in terms of rewards but in terms of how we earn progression.

Of course, being PvP-focsed there isn't any content to become obsolete, but the design principles should be applicable to a PvE game too. CSE are doing everything they can to bring people together, rather than force them apart.

cheyane

I recall in EQ2 there were parts of dungeons that were for higher level mobs. Everquest also did that think Guk, Solusek if I recall correctly and even lower level outdoor zones had higher level mobs.

There was also the market in East Commonlands tunnel so that place saw a lot of traffic. People came back to cities to bank too and craft. Of course as the game matured people had more money for ports and so on you saw less traffic in the Karanas or Kithicor and ButcherBlock.

AAAMEOW

Probably why forced grouping is a bad idea.  Imagine playing a game that required a group but can't find any people to group with.  

Kyleran

cameltosis said:

Mendel said:

This is a problem created by an echo chamber environment.  First generation developers only knew tabletop games, so developed a version of those.  Subsequent generations of developers learned from the games the first generation developed.  I fully expect the next generation of developers to do the same thing.

The 'outdated content' problem was (and still is) an issue with tabletop games.  It's incredibly difficult to create content that low and max levels can both succeed at the same time without creating massive unbalance in the game.

Is there a real solution?  I don't know.  I expect it will require a completely fresh approach by (very) talented developers who are willing to challenge the paradigms developed by prior developers, and even question the tabletop elements (like progression levels, Hit Points, and others).

Of course, being PvP-focused there isn't any content to become obsolete, but the design principles should be applicable to a PvE game too. CSE are doing everything they can to bring people together, rather than force them apart.

Well, doing everything they can except actually deliver a playable game you meant.

Talraekk

Really my only game (in terms of advanced age) was WoW.  And for a long time it held its own.  Old zones, even while being old, held a spot in the curve of leveling.  I think, nowadays, with the advent of everything (is) (good) in terms of content and leveling we lose that... place for everything.  Even ESO, before its One Tamriel update, I, personally fealt more at home in all content before everything being scaled to... everyone.  And I personallly feel this is an issue, across the board, for EVERY mmo.  IT's... HARD keeping content relevant, but designating all, or the very least nearly all, sub (max) content 'RELEVANT' causes so many issues gear issues, quest issues, grouping issues.  Just, give groups the option for rewards (and scaling) and everyone else the option to just... freaking.... be able to defeat shit.

Kyleran

I see complaints about zones becoming irrelevant but have to wonder if this isn't the natural order of the universe really.

In many real life situations once most humans master a particular challenge they move on to a new one if they have the time and resources to do so.

Sure, some folks will climb the Matterhorn multiple times, trying a different route or face each time, but eventually most move on to Kilimanjaro, McKinley or Everest.

My father used golf regularly at his local club, but he used to travel the country playing on different courses and would have played a different one daily if he could have afforded to.

Surfers, same thing, from California to Hawaii to Australia to the positively insane 100 foot waves off the coast of Portugal, given they have the resources no one surfs the same waves if they don't have to.

Perhaps folks here are trying to solve the wrong problem?

As I see it the real issue is why do new players to any game eventually taper off to near zero.

New gamers enter the market every day, yet there are hundreds of thousands if not millions of gamers who have never played a particular MMORPG, even amongst those who favor the genre.

Also it's an issue of retention, millions have tried EVE according to CCP, and many still give it a go even today, yet they rarely stick around.

So I'm thinking the real problems which there needs to be more innovation on are attracting and retaining new players ad infinitum so that lower level content always remains active.

I realize neither solves the issue of making them relevant forever to those who've already completed the content, but hey, no way to make climbing the same mountain fun forever either is there?

Talraekk

Eh, as to the previous post, I feel ALL that is an issue of retention.   Partly (sometimes) or (mostly) an issue of playing previously played zones.  Most games have multi factions, which make zones partially different depending on the playthrough.  That, however, (previous post) feels most akin to areas in single player games.  There ARE only so many times you could realistically go up (or in) a zone.  A single ( or relatively small multi) playthrough of ANY mmo means your seeing the same content.  It's more a factor of how much repeating content on /relatively/ similar characters can you...... go through.

Good mmos (Great mmos) Have both new content and different areas for any new character (Barring...... life/time/tons o content blocks/ We can only write so much).

I personally feel (and I don't feel ANY mmo has reached this yet) that individual character.... uniqueness is a vital part to actual game length (class/stats/gear).  I personally feel mmos have cut the individual down to a damn nub, and that people with less ... group/party oriented ideals are cut down.  Many MUD's currently offer the variety we need, but either don't have the manpower or cater to the party need..

FrodoFragins

I've never seen a solution that I liked.  I also like vertical progression and going back to zones that were once challenging and seeing how much I've progressed. 

I'm not much of a fan of scaling unless there are simply too many zones to level in and so you pick and choose.  But even then I prefer old style design and leveling.  Retail WOW where you can skip almost all expansions doesn't appeal to me.

And so if you don't use scaling I guess a better solution is to use phasing so that people see different versions of a zone, assuming you want to reuse them but not impact lower level characters.

For me, most zones are for character and world development.  They don't HAVE to be returned to except on alts.

Amaranthar

Mendel said:

This is a problem created by an echo chamber environment.  First generation developers only knew tabletop games, so developed a version of those.  Subsequent generations of developers learned from the games the first generation developed.  I fully expect the next generation of developers to do the same thing.

The 'outdated content' problem was (and still is) an issue with tabletop games.  It's incredibly difficult to create content that low and max levels can both succeed at the same time without creating massive unbalance in the game.

Is there a real solution?  I don't know.  I expect it will require a completely fresh approach by (very) talented developers who are willing to challenge the paradigms developed by prior developers, and even question the tabletop elements (like progression levels, Hit Points, and others).

A few years back, I tried to engage this community with the idea of breaking away from D&D mechanics; some of you may remember it.  Tabletop gaming is all based on integer math.  Tabletops use integer math because it is easy for most people, and dice are adequate methods of randomization.  There wasn't much support to ditch the conventions created 50 years ago.  People are just too stuck on familiar ideas, and don't want to innovate.

Someone is going to have to make a major break from the past.  That will take lots of money, some brilliant individuals to rethink everything, and more support from management than other games have had.  Then the resulting product will have to be sold, hard, to players that won't recognize a new type of MMORPG when it arrives.  It will probably appear out of nowhere with little fanfare, much like MMORPGs did, or cRPGs before that, or even computer gaming in general.

I only have one issue with your post.
"The 'outdated content' problem was (and still is) an issue with tabletop games.  It's incredibly difficult to create content that low and max levels can both succeed at the same time without creating massive unbalance in the game."

It's not "low and max levels", it's Low and Mid, and Mid and Max, levels. 
Having content designed for all takes away from Advancement. That's not good. 

Why do people still ignore the most obvious "Fix" there is? 
Reduce the Power Gaps. 
You can easily enhance the leveling experience with all of the ideas that have already been used. Maybe come up with some new ones too. 
Such as WoW's Rogue ability to throw down that powder and go into stealth, as just one example. 

Such a game has so much potential for all the things that are wrong, or missing, from the status quo. 

While I love the Skill based ideal best, I'd gladly play a Class based game with reduced Power Gaps, especially if they added in a mix of Class and Skill add-ons. 

Theocritus

Depends on if the game lends itself to playing many alts......and if it is wasting resources people worry about, why not just make one zone and everything levels with you? Level scaling is one of the worst mechanics ever......

Amaranthar

Theocritus said:

Depends on if the game lends itself to playing many alts......and if it is wasting resources people worry about, why not just make one zone and everything levels with you? Level scaling is one of the worst mechanics ever......

Because then you never feel like you're progressing. And you don't feel like your character has an identity in such a world. It's all fit to you, and to everyone else, and your advancement means nothing. 

Either your toon is tuned, or the world is tuned to your toon, it doesn't matter, it's all the same basic thing. And it feels empty of meaning. 

delete5230

AAAMEOW said:

Probably why forced grouping is a bad idea.  Imagine playing a game that required a group but can't find any people to group with.  

Every game had a social panel but everyone didn't seem to know about it. 
I could find groups easily in most every mmorpg. Even Vanguard at the end when populations were at their lowest.