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Let's Talk about Linear Dungeons...
Paragus1
Member UncommonPosts: 1,741
/rant on
How come nobody ever brings this up when we talk about MMOs? In light of Vanguard getting its harsh criticism, it seems it may have gone the way of World Of Warcraft in its dungeon design. Linear dungeons in my view are totally lame and a major turn off. I'm not making this thread to bash WoW, but I'm going to use it as an example. How many of the dungeons in this game are pretty much a stright line with no other variations? Shadowfang, Scarlet Monestary, Wailing Caverns, LBRS, UBRS, MC, BWL, Van Cleef etc. all seem to be designed by a guy who must live in a hallway somewhere. Members of my guild have been playing the Vanguard beta and have been telling me that every dungeon they have visited has followed this same format.
Maybe I'm just an old timer, but what ever happened to dungeons like Guk that were sprawling complexes of elaborate tunnels, ledges, ladders, and catwalks going every which way? However strongly you feel for the rest of the game, I think its about time we start shining a light on this aspect of games in this genre. FFXI, whether you love it or hate it, has some serious dungeons, many of which are upwards of 6-9 floors with multiple ways up and down and multiple entrences. Even EQ2 newbie dungeon Stormhold has paths going all over the place. I think it adds a lot to the immersion factor of going into a place to explore. It just annoys me to see hyped games and "Next gen" garbage have their dungeons as a straight path with a few side rooms with a boss every 50 feet or so. I remember AC1 had some amazing dungeons that required jumping on platforms, acid pits, locked doors, and I remember Olthoi nests with tunnels fanning out everywhere. I mean don't get me wrong, I understand that there has to be a top and a bottom with the dungeons boss, but can devs please stop making it a straight line in between? Help us get lost in dungeons again considering it usually ends up being the place where a good portion of our time is spent.
/rant off
How come nobody ever brings this up when we talk about MMOs? In light of Vanguard getting its harsh criticism, it seems it may have gone the way of World Of Warcraft in its dungeon design. Linear dungeons in my view are totally lame and a major turn off. I'm not making this thread to bash WoW, but I'm going to use it as an example. How many of the dungeons in this game are pretty much a stright line with no other variations? Shadowfang, Scarlet Monestary, Wailing Caverns, LBRS, UBRS, MC, BWL, Van Cleef etc. all seem to be designed by a guy who must live in a hallway somewhere. Members of my guild have been playing the Vanguard beta and have been telling me that every dungeon they have visited has followed this same format.
Maybe I'm just an old timer, but what ever happened to dungeons like Guk that were sprawling complexes of elaborate tunnels, ledges, ladders, and catwalks going every which way? However strongly you feel for the rest of the game, I think its about time we start shining a light on this aspect of games in this genre. FFXI, whether you love it or hate it, has some serious dungeons, many of which are upwards of 6-9 floors with multiple ways up and down and multiple entrences. Even EQ2 newbie dungeon Stormhold has paths going all over the place. I think it adds a lot to the immersion factor of going into a place to explore. It just annoys me to see hyped games and "Next gen" garbage have their dungeons as a straight path with a few side rooms with a boss every 50 feet or so. I remember AC1 had some amazing dungeons that required jumping on platforms, acid pits, locked doors, and I remember Olthoi nests with tunnels fanning out everywhere. I mean don't get me wrong, I understand that there has to be a top and a bottom with the dungeons boss, but can devs please stop making it a straight line in between? Help us get lost in dungeons again considering it usually ends up being the place where a good portion of our time is spent.
/rant off
Comments
yeah that was an annoyance of mine with WoW as well, though, when the aim with them is to get from the start to the end then linearity probably makes sense. Disappointed to hear Vanguard has opted for linearity, EQ's dungeons were great.
It takes much less time and effort to make a linear dungeon. The current crop of MMOs (and most n the horizon) generally have the goal of the fastest release date. In the time to make 2 non-linear dungeon designs you could probably design 5 or more linear dungeons of the same relative size. WoW was fun upto 60 because you weren't put on a linear path. WoW was grinding and boring at 60 because there was only a linear path (MC > Ony >BWL initially, then ZG > AQ20 > MC > BWL > AQ40 [optional since it was replaced entirely with early NAX drops] > NAX). Repetative and boring.
/Yawn
Oh and 5 dungeons looks better on release/update notes than 2 dungeons.
In WoW for example a LOT of work goes into the placement of every enemy, the amount of room you to execute a strategy to deal with them. In EQ, the graphical demand for a dungeon was no where near that of today. back then models were MUCH faster to make, encounters were not really that complicated at all. Now people demand scripted encounters, new and nice graphics. Its a labour intensive process that takes months to do. People want Content, and if they took the time to spread the dungeon out and make it all non-linear it might take a few extra months. Id be willing to bet most people dont want to wait all that extra time to make dungeons less linear. Game companies like Blizzard know this, they arent stupid. They cater to what the majority of people want. Thats nice graphics, scripted challanging encounters, with pretty and powerful rewards.
Keep in mind there is a reason developers and designers do the things they do. They have to get some done in a limited time, with limited resources. You have to prioritize. They dont just decide by rolling a die, its a hard process.
after 6 or so years, I had to change it a little...
I don't think it's a result of any developer's laziness or lack of resources. Take WoW, for instance. The fact is, many of WoW's dungeons take a long time to complete as they are. Even the most diehard raiders say they get tired of mowing through all the fluff enemies before they reach the bosses. There are already one or two side paths for the odd quest in most dungeons. People skip them because their goal is to complete the instance in the least amount of time possible.
Ultimately, I don't think the average raid dungeon should be complicated, nor do I think the average gamer would like it. Make one or two like that, maybe, but making them all larger just adds an extra timesink, forcing you to kill more of the same enemies you're going to have to kill 1,000 times anyway to complete the instance.
It would be really great if someone released a MMO where you design the dungeion with a trully comprehensive tool.
Heres an idea for a game Dungeon master online.
Basically be a goody or a baddy and build a dungeoon around you like in the origonal dungeion maser exept with tunnels going up and down rather than being one level. Then intergrate a surface world thing with monsters etc like standarsd mmo's and in this game the dungeons you raid can be either npc ones or player ones.
Think of it this way. WIth Plane of Fear in EQ. I was a monk and everyone monk ive talked to went the exact same path through fear with little variation. you cant tell me you took a completly different path everytime because whenever we tried to spice it up, problems arose. And noone wants to lose a couple hours of gaming, so the path that worked was used. Now with a non-instanced raid you have a schedule that you have to keep up with and a wipe in eq was devastating. You can just leave reset and try again you had to summon everyones corpses, and rez. so the non-linear dungeon is a nice concept if you want to look around and see like 50 mobs as potential adds or see the landscape of the game, but mostly you'll run through the same way everytime and whats the use of creating expansive raid encounters when everyones going to do it the same way.
Try Saga of Ryzom, man. It's the only MMORPG with any real ability for players to add content. It's not my cup of tea, but I recommend you give it a shot if you want something which lets you make content. It's probably best to ask for more info on the Ryzom forums.
Just to warn you, though, the original developers, Nevrax, went into receivership a few months back. They got bought up in their entirety by a German browser game publisher, GameForge. Though development still seems to be in the hands of the original team, I've heard some stories about billing issues arising when the business side of the game was shifted to GameForge. They might be mostly resolved now, but I'd ask about that too.
making non-linear dungeons is not hard. In fact, some rather complex dungeons can be generated randomly. Please see NetHack, Angband, and Classic Rogue.
If you saying what I think you're saying, you want dungeons more in line with olde skool games like The Bard's Tale, Wizardry, and most of the AD&D "gold box" games of the early to mid '90s. Can't really say that I want to relive the final tower of the first Phantasy Star game or starve to death in Undermountain (again), but to each their own.
I can only imagine how much worse those dungeons would be with a bunch of whining MMO players, both vets and newbies, equally lost. There's a reason why most MMORPG dungeons don't include traps and sections that loop between levels. What works in a single player game, get easily confused when the herd mentality enters the picture.
WOW's Raids/instances have always impressed me in terms of their scale.
Look at SWG's it's just the same textures over and over again with the same layout. For expansions though they do 1 or 2 new layouts and repeat them about 5 times
Arsehole! I downloaded Rogue because of this and now I'm addicted to it again. Damn you for that link!
I don't think I would agree with you on the scripted encounter thing. Scripted encounter susually have to be instanced, and instancing in my opinion opens up a whole differnent slew of problems, but we'll save that for another thread. I don't think it would take that much longer to make a dungeon have a few more ways to go, and Im sure raiders will always appreciate having a choice on selecting which targets they would like to persue instead of having to walk the same line everytime and be forced to waste time on less desirable targets.
Maybe I am old school and like the old Wizardry type dungeons. I liked the old Phantasy Star games
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AC had some of the BEST MMO dungeons I ever played. Some of them where linear but many of them were nightmares to figure out. Anything released that I have tried in the past 3 or so years just doesn't have any of the challenge or creativity behind it. I remember getting so pissed off because I missed a turn or went the wrong way....Dungeons now a days might look better but I have yet to have to jump over an acid pit or swing across something, damn locked gates, mazes, puzzles, frickin riddles......or have "rolling balls of Doom" to get past! There are so many dungeons and quest in AC, I don't think anyone has done it all.
I would love to see an updated version of the original AC. I'm there baby, ready and waiting. These were the damn good old days lol.
To bad no one plays this anymore
it's been going for ages, and might seem to be a bit dated. but they manage to get new dungeons in nearly every month that are not linier. some of the dungeons in AC can take ages to get to know. and the game benefits from this.
what's the use of just going in one direction all the time to get to the end of a dungeon? just gets borring.
vanguard is supposed to have loads of areas to explore, and i'm looking forward to that aspect. but i'd also like to be able to spend time exploring dungeons as well instead of just walking down glorified passage.
hopefully there are some non linier dungeons somewhere in the game
i look this wrecked because i've got GIST.
Whats your excuse?
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AC had some of the BEST MMO dungeons I ever played. Some of them where linear but many of them were nightmares to figure out. Anything released that I have tried in the past 3 or so years just doesn't have any of the challenge or creativity behind it. I remember getting so pissed off because I missed a turn or went the wrong way....Dungeons now a days might look better but I have yet to have to jump over an acid pit or swing across something, damn locked gates, mazes, puzzles, frickin riddles......or have "rolling balls of Doom" to get past! There are so many dungeons and quest in AC, I don't think anyone has done it all.
I would love to see an updated version of the original AC. I'm there baby, ready and waiting. These were the damn good old days lol.
To bad no one plays this anymore
LOL, dude I used to love that stuff. One of my favorite and most memorable dungeon experiences was the fletching tool dungeon. You had to have the group split into 2 teams, into 2 different paths. Each path had to pull levers to open doors for the other team and vise versa. If either of the teamks got wiped out you had to abort the entire mission. Then right near the end, there was a giant acid pit that everyone had to jump over. If your jump skill wasnt high enough you were treating a hot searing death, no rezzes, just a ticket back to town instantly
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LOL, dude I used to love that stuff. One of my favorite and most memorable dungeon experiences was the fletching tool dungeon. You had to have the group split into 2 teams, into 2 different paths. Each path had to pull levers to open doors for the other team and vise versa. If either of the teamks got wiped out you had to abort the entire mission. Then right near the end, there was a giant acid pit that everyone had to jump over. If your jump skill wasnt high enough you were treating a hot searing death, no rezzes, just a ticket back to town instantly
Lord, that game was full of dungeons like that.
That death you mentioned. That was harsh. Ista - port back to your lifestone...no rez crap buddy, do not pass "go" and "do not collect two hundred dollars", run back and try again....oh and don't forget to pick up all the gear you left behind on death lol.
What about the platform "dungeons" (for lack of a better word) suspended up in the sky? Ever fall off of one of those?
Its really to bad MMO's shifted course and went with grind instead of fun.
There are benefits to a random dungeon. It's also damn near impossible to adequately balance them. Because they're, you know, random.
I can think of any number of times I'd drop down to the Butcher's lair, look at the layout and say "Ah, this will be simple" and proceed to slaughter him easily. Then other times I'd say "Eh." and go reset the dungeon.
Expand that to something like WoW.
Can you *imagine* the forums?
"OMFG!!!!! SUPERDUPERGUILD ran NAXX like 12 times last night, and every time, there was a huge spawn of MEGAMOBS EVERY time. Then THATOTHERGUILDIHATE ran it, and like, there was nothing! They just waltzed in and got SUPEREPICWEAPON like 9 times! WTF BLIZZ?!"
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For as much effort as it takes to setup a single path (and Naxx is 4 shorter single paths for convenience to continue the dungeon later, much a kin to SM) it takes dramatically more effort to create a non-linear path. For each main path you have 2+ paths that take jsut as much effort to make. It doens't sound like much, but add it up and the time and effort spent is multiples of anything in a linear path.
FFXI and DAoC haver far fewer dungeons than WoW, but you go back to them. Once you outlevel somethign in WoW you have no need to ever return. Which is one thing that irks me about WoW there is no reasn to be anywhere but near the end instance or in a twn which just lowers player to player interactions. In FFXI for example you can enter a level 60 to 75 area from the starting zones or go deeper in a dungeon to go from level 30 mobs to completely unsoloable mobs at level cap.
Players of different levels are all over the game world because they have need to be.
In April i bought AC, just to see what it was all about. I had just come from doing endless raids in WoW, then i finally played AC...and holy shit.
I made a few friends in-game and they hooked me up with weapons and armor, sent me to the arcades to lessen the Olthoi population, and just get stronger overall. Then we finally grouped and did some of the dungeons like you're talking about Torak. OMG. omgomgomg.
The quests and dungeons in that game are legendary compared to the silly linear fight-through-15-waves-of-trash-mobs-to-get-boss & loot, rinse & repeat dungeon/instances that i've played in most modern games. DAoC did these pretty darn good, especially Darkness Falls with those levels you could jump down, and it gets harder and harder..ahh those were good times
I believe that is one of the main reasons why you will find a strong opposition to WoW on this community. This website specializes in MMORPGs. Many of the people on this site have been fortunate enough to have played many games in this genre that existed long before it ever came out. People who have been around the block and seen the things a lot of us have can understand just how magical the game can become if it is designed right. It's a shame a game like Asheron's Call didn't have the sales WoW has now. Could you imagine where we would be, and what the games of today would look like? Seemless zoneless worlds would be standard, skill systems would be the norm, and deep character developement would be expected.
Probably one of the greatest tragedies in this genre in my opinion is AC2. They had the winning formula in their hands, all they had to do with the sequel was update the graphic engine and address a few other issues. What we got instead was a game that had almost nothing in common with the original other then location names. Turbine would be a true powerhouse of the industry. Ever since that mess, they have produced hot steamile piles of poo that capitalize on famous franchises to trick consumers into buying it. Dungeosn and Dragons online was a disgrace to anyone who has played the table top. LOTR online looks like someone stole some DNA from WoW and had a cloning experiment gone horribly wrong.
I remeber playing AC1, and there were villains played by humans who would walk the world and ravage the countryside. The God came down out of the heavens once, flew over towns, and assaulted everything in site. The players were immersed in a story to try to find a way to stop these villians from conttinuing their reigns of terror. To think that somehow we went from that to an instanced hallway with a boss every 10 feet is sad indeed.
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I dunno, I think the old MMO's had things right. Why can't we just go back and re-do the old? How about an AC redone? Maybe the new UO graphics will help UO and maybe WAR will bring some of the DAoC magic back into the genre? Lets hope. MMO's are starting to become as predictable as First person shooters.
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