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MMO's Getting Stale? Post your Ideas!
Soejckdswg
Member Posts: 338
mmo's when i first started playing them were in most part a fairly "New" experience in gaming. And now that in my opinion i feel its reaching that age to where the "newness" has worn off i feel like its getting a bit stale. the industry seems like its gasping for New Ideas cause over and over again you see new games come out and their just rehash's of other games, same mechanics different skins. What else can the industry do to bring the life back to mmo's, Quenkers anyone? Really, there seems to be a lot of hesitation to actually be on the frontier of inventing new ideas and i understand from a business perspective wow/eq clones make money but does it really help the industry move along? seems to me they're milking it for all its worth till its dead then move on. there's a few companies out there that say screw the status quo we're going to try new things whether it works or not, and that to me is the risk that i think the industry needs to make in order to progress to making better games.
what do you think that gaming industries can do to bring that Spark back to mmo's that there used to be. for me i think one the number one things companies need to work on is first customer service. when it comes down to which companies are making the money and which aren't the most common factor that most of the successful mmo's have is they have great customer service, they provide a virtual bug free game and superior support for their base as well as great interaction and the sense of ownership. Another imo is Make a Complete game! who likes having their characters nerf'd after they've invested a ton of time into creating him? Elder Jedi comes to mind......(yes, swg vet ai yai yai...) thanks for reading the post and hope some people have some good ideas.
Defiant
lvl 40 ss/ea brute
Ceasar
Pre-Cu Jedi Knight Elder Extroardinaire
Sheol
lvl 150 Progen Warrior now deceased in the harddrive compactor or possibly re-formatted to sim city
Comments
One thing they could do is turn my idea into a game. I don't say that with conceit, I just honestly believe I have a formula for a killer MMO. I won't repost it here, just the link. I'm not giving up on this idea yet. Everyone says companies has plenty of ideas, but I have to wonder. I'm not seeing much of anything new. I think they need a fresh perspective. They need to stop thinking of MMOs as games and start thinking of them as artificial worlds that players want to exist in. I wonder if any of them really do that.
http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/thread/77967
The basic thing they could do is to remember that games are meant to be fun. Current MMO makers seem stuck in the 'get them addicted, then make gigantic timesinks, then rake in the cash'. This works for the relatively small market that likes it, but is why the MMO market stayed pretty much static until WOW came along. I think some companies have gotten the idea, AOC and WAR both look like they're focusing on making the game enjoyable instead of seeing how big of a grind people will stomach. The trick is not making a game 'more hardcore'; while there are a few (often vocal) people who do want things like strong death penalties and annoying time wasters (like no maps) most people don't play games to be irritated.
I guess that's why Wow is such a hit? it's got less depth than a politician's conscience. I like complicated. I've been waiting years for complicated. This year there are several lined up:
Dark and Light has some intriguing ideas that are more than killing your way to the top. you can be makiaveli too
Vanguard (iffy for the pvp)
Darkfall (no release date
Age of Conan (ditto on release date
I'm also looking at Roma Victor and a few others. Hard means I wont be watching the telly and tabbing out to irc while playing. is that too much to ask?
Fun means you won't want to go to other entertainment like the TV or IRC while playing the game, you'll actually ENJOY THE GAME. You seem to have the MMO brain disease, where you think 'make gameplay complicated so I can't play it and watch TV at the same time' is somehow a reasonable idea. I consider a game a failure if you want a second activity to actually entertain yourself while playing it, regardless of whether the game is slow/simple enough for you to do the other activity.
It's not about depth or complexity or anything like that, it's about focusing on actually making the game enjoyable. Whether to make a game complicated or simple is tangental to making it fun, though it affects who will find the game fun. I used to play board wargames, and in comparison to something like Advanced Squad Leader, Star Fleet Battles, or Advanced Third Reich any MMO looks like some kids game. But I never felt like 'man, if this game was simpler, I'd be watching TV while I set up my Russa invasion', I would get into the game for the whole time I played. On the opposite end of complexity, I sometimes enjoy a game like tetris or one of the 'blow up the same colored crystals' games, but if I felt so bored while playing one that I wanted to watch TV then I wouldn't play it again.
I also wanna restrict pvp were if you pvp in a specified arena you can gain fame and through it get special missions and items. Also if you dont PVP within in it then you gain a wanted record and must run from bounty hunters. Open unrestricted pvp is only fun for one person; but consensual restricted Open PVP is fun for all.
id like to see a MMO based on a war between angels and demons, heaven and hell ...
good and evil ...
it can be set in all 3 places ... heaven ... hell .. and earth ... and you can either be a race of human .. a race of demon .. or a race of angel ...
spirits, ghosts, ghostbusters ...
you try to infect or save the souls of people ect... cause accidents or save people from them ..
all sorts of stuff .. and as one side wins over the other .. you see the effects transpire on earth ...
Casual, Casual, Casual. We need MMOs that you can pick up and play in time frames of an hour or less and have fun with. That doesn't mean that the game has to lack depth, "minutes to learn, lifetime to master" is the mantra here.
I also don't think that having fun with a game means that your character advances uber fast. Character advancement should be the most transparent and least significant part of a role playing game. Don't believe me? Think about some of the best single player RPGs that you've played and tell me how many stressed character advancement over exploration, combat or puzzle solving. There are plenty of Browser based MMOs that revolve around grinding and character advancement. I demand more out of games with real-time, 3D environments. To make an anology, tricking out your car in Gran Turismo was a core element of the game, but the actual racing was a blast. MMOs need to focus more on making gameplay fun and less on holding out rewards to keep players grinding through garbage.
I couldn't really tell you what makes a good RPG though. Diablo was tons of fun in harcore mode, even though it was basically just a clickfest. I also though Phantasy Star Online was good. There are a lot of RPGs that were great but didn't stray to far from the hack, slash, and poke formula. I think that concentrating game design on something other than leveling for the sake of leveling is what we need to make MMOs shine. I'm just not sure how to do that...
For the hardcore MMO crowd, I would like to see more emphasis on virtual world games where the players are given control over content in terms of territories and politics, diplomacy and empire building. Sort of like what CCP has done in EVE but with even more complexity and in a non-space setting. Severe, meaningful death penalties, but significant things to defend, and good reasons to risk death. Something like that would be very popular with the core MMO crowd, I think.
Lets see...
* One where you play all the generic fantasy monsters. Giant Spiders, Giant Rats, Kobolds, etc. No humans/elves/dwarves. Instead, they're NPCs that live in their own NPC cities which you raid. You have to defend your hive/nest/ruins from stray adventuters trying to ding.
* Timeless space from Sluggy Freelance. It has a story and bizarre game mechanics built in.
* Game where you play an MMO player character who realizes he's stuck in a game and is trying to escape the MMO.
Is there really a core MMO crowd that forms a 'dedicated market'? I mean, do these "core" MMO fans want Realm vs Realm PVP, wide open PVP, consentual PVP, no PVP, or what? Do they want no raids (like UO) or raiding as the primary focus of high-level play (like EQ)? Do they want gear to be pretty much unimportant (like old UO), or the main determiner of character power (like EQ) and do they gear mainly made by players (like EVE) or mainly acquired through PVE fights (like EQ)? You talk about a game where players fight over control of territories, but how is that going to be popular with 'core gamers' who like games like FFXI and EQ-OriginalRecipie, with heavy emphasis on grouping and raiding PVE content and essentially no PVP content?
When you saye "core" MMO fans by itself it seems like it's a big group, but the various people who consider themselves "core" MMO fans vary widely on what they want in a game. Before you can expect serious discussion on making games that cater to the 'core' MMO crowd, you should really define who they are.
Plus you've clearly got advanced MMO brain disease when you can use 'fun [type of game]' in a derogatory way, and speak of people who seek entertainement in a game like it's a strange thing to do.
If you like severe, meaningful death penalties, you can implement them yourself in any game. Want permadeath? Delete your character if you die. Want item loss on death? Ditch your items when you die. Want a serious death penalty in EVE? Don't keep an updated clone, so you actually risk injury to your character and not just a disposeable ship. As much as some people talk about harsh death penalties and how they allegedly make a game better, they don't seem to actually seek them out much in practice. The 'harsh death penalty' bit seems to be much more of a bragging tool that something that people really seek out in games; it's easy to say "man, we were so much tougher in that old game where you lost so much if you died".
There are so many MMO already it seems everyone can at least find one they like enough to toy with if not addict themselves to.
As for an idea(not sure if these are new):
1>How about something like Werewolf Dark Ages? A game where it is religious humans(Inquisitors) vs Werewolves and their clans vs Vampires? The inquisition aspect of the game reminds me a little of the "secret religious sect fighting evil" in Van Helsing
I personally do not like pvp, but something like a three sided faction race on race pvp thing might be interesting. I might even try it
2> A true Shadowrun MMO. Not that thing that will release soon but real Shadowrun.. deckers, seatle, street samurai, physical adepts, There are so many possibilities.. actual having to fight in cyberspace as a decker with the "deck" as your skill levels. Having a crafter for weapon mods. deck makers? vehicle mods? street docs for implants? Just throwing out ideas. Haven't played Shadowrun the pnp in many years so not sure how they changed things
3> Another 3 faction pvp idea would be Starcraft.
I apologize if these are dumb or already covered ideas. These are just what popped into my head when I read through the post
Gothic Cyberpunk
did anyone ever play "Bloodnet"? (or are any of you even that old?) if not, http://www.mobygames.com/game/bloodnet
basically, a not so distant future metropolis (think gotham but slummier) filled with drug dealers, crooks, scientists with implants and very poor. the city revolves around a "web/internet" type reality and there are also VR junkies who can jack themselves in and be literally locked inside a virtual world for hours on end (too real?)
theres also vampires thrown in, for the hell of it i guess but it fit well ..lol
basically theres 3 worlds if you will.. the street, virtual reality and the vampires who feed on the above.
sounds stupid, but to this day that was one of the best games I ever played and I think the scenerio, if tweaked, would make an awesome and original MMO
"If you want a picture of the future, imagine a robot foot stomping on a human face -- forever."
Good post. First I think MMORPGs have split since the gen 2 (UO, EQ and AC being gen 1).
There are online worlds, and then online games.
UO is an online world (crafting, pets, custom housing, player towns, notoriety, plants, quests, combat, etc).
DDO, is an online game. Diablo is an online game. Quests and combat which you repeat over and over.
Well, Blizzard (as usual) has a huge success with WoW. So all the MMORPG developers are saying, wait a tick, that really isn't an online world. It's more of a online game. Let's just do that and look at all the dev time we can save by not doing all this other stuff which makes it truly a "world".
Next, your game idea hits me, because I have a couple too. What I like to think of is that I'll never get my ideas done, but if I share them, maybe some dev team will listen and include it in their game. So, that's why I'm active on official forums for games I'm really interested in. If a game comes out and it's better for the ideas we as the community had, we all benefit.
I'm actually also getting sick of seeing the price per month rising. UO used to be (and I think it still is) $9-10 a month, the next one after UO was also the same (I think it was EQ). Now games are demanding $15 a month, soo they will be up to $20 and possibly $30. I'm not saying this is going to happen in the next few years, but in the future, they'll eek it up dollar by dollar.
Also these fake MMOs are charging to play them, like DDO and it's ilk. This is where I think ArenaNet got smart and didn't charge for playing Guiildwars.
Really I'd like to see unlimited demos and lower/free prices. Since MMOs aren't just a timesink, but a money sink as well. (Also not charging per month and charging only for goodies, the user can choose to play your game even if they are playing 20 other MMOs because yours is free to play.)
Very true. I'm playing (and paying) DDO right now and am not happy with it. For $15.99(?) a month it's really nothing more than Diablo which is an online game, not an online world. Graphics are awesome and the game is fun, but after I max out, my account will be cancelled and it's a shame because it's a great game.
Turbine seems to think I"m gonna come back if they up the level cap to 12 or 15 or create 5-10 new dungeons. Sorry, ain't gonna happen. I'm at level 5 and it's getting repetitive already. By level 10 I'll be bored outta my gord. The point being, not enough depth / content / je-na-sais-quois.
I respect your opinion and share some goals, but I disagree.
Casuals must feel HOME, that they have EVERYTHING they need, not that everything inthe game is casual! Grind and achievement are not enemies, they are just not to be the main goal. A strong system with tons of grind is good, however if you have nothing else, you are in for some troubles.
Real-Time is acceptable, not even a necessity. It is untrue that the average player has to play in real-time...many won't play game that aren't real time, but many will respect game that focus on 'thinking'.
Anyway, I don't think you are far from the 'holy grail', but I think you take a few wrong paths. A game that can't please any hardcore is not much better than a game that can't please the casuals.
A game should be conceive for the casuals, they are the majority, but it should be robust enough for the hardcores. I always love the casual aspect of a game and if I have to pick between a casual only or hardcore only, I will pick a casual only and leave in in a few days. Really, conceive the game for the casuals, but make it robust enough for the hardcores.
PS: Me I have a strong belief in unlimited levels and a level cap on every zone except one...but that is my personal belief where I may be wrong, yet I believe I am right...above, I KNOW it is right, it is not a mere belief.
- "If I understand you well, you are telling me until next time. " - Ren
The most used word in this thread may be
FUN...
Source: The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
fun (noun)
A source of enjoyment, amusement, or pleasure.
The problem is, what's fun for you may not be fun for me.
One man's pain is another man's pleasure...
IMO, there just isn't enough server space, money, nor programming knowledge and time to make a game that is universally fun. All we can do is hope that someone is able to appeal, in some ways, to most of us... and their investors hope that as well.
Anyway, what I'd like to see is
I could go on but it gets repetitive.
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Vagabond Spirit in search of a home...
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