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General: Saturday Debate: Fantasy Races
Stradden
Managing EditorMember CommonPosts: 6,696
News Editor Garrett Fuller and Staff Writer Derek Czerkaski sit down to discuss the issue of Traditional fantasy races.
Derek Czerkaski:Alright, sweet, a new MMO! THIS ONE is going to set the bar for MMORPG's for generations to come, I just know it! Let's get this beast installed, and get to playing it already. While I'm waiting, I guess I'll have a look at what races are available for me to play. Let's see here, we've got two human races, but who wants to be a human in-game and out of game? We've got 4 variations of Elves, that's pretty weak. They look like humans, except with pointy ears. Oh cool, Greenskins, yet they're basically just uglier, green variations of humans. Oh there are the Dwarves and Gnomes. Gee, a bearded, midget human race; how incredibly creative. Last, we have 2 Barbarian-like races, more super-sized humans.
What is this crap? Doesn't anyone have anything creative on their mind out there? Twelve unique races huh, because it looks like humans with palette swaps and varied skins to me. How come every race in the history of all fantasy worlds are nearly identical too each other, minus some simple lore details? Don't game developers have any cool ideas? I'd love to play as a spider-race, wielding six weapons at one time, and not being able to wear armor. How about playing as a winged race, where I can fly? Heck, maybe I'd like to play as a mole race, that's capable of burrowing to set up traps, or ambush their enemies by hiding underground. I'm sick and tired of running around playing as the same generic garbage in a fantasy setting. If you're going to offer me unique races, make them truly stand out from the crowd.
You can read the whole debate here.
Cheers,
Jon Wood
Managing Editor
MMORPG.com
Comments
Making a game mechanic especially with such a biased, 1-way view on a 1-on-1 combat situation is a formula for disaster. Even with games such as Warhammer that focus on a large scale war effort, there is still a sense of individual accomplishment and 1-on-1 PvP, at least that is what many of the previews have been hinting at.
The other issue with going crazy with making new races is the idea of being able to relate to them as humans. Humaniod races are easy to relate to, which is what makes them so popular. Even if they may be a color switch or a re-skin, Orcs are Green Humans with probably better strength, Elfs are taller and better with Magic, the whole nine yards.
The game, Shadowbane had many strange and "out there" races, even some races that had wings and could fly. Although it didn't really make much of a difference in gameplay at all. Especially for a game to be played by thousands of players, any "dominant" race that may have an unfair advantage will be exploited.
I still like the idea, but I don't see personally how it could make a significant difference in a new kind of gameplay experience.
The problem i see is the balancing issue, already there are huge arguments over differing levels of power between classes and races, and adding another dimension would add significant workload onto developers.
This is where Star Trek Online can stand out, i do not actualy know if it is going to be possible but if it is then i think that ip can bring forth many different races tho still somewhat familiar because of the movies/tv serie and what else but still their should be alott to choose from and make them destinct towards other classes. Klingons, humans, andorians, talaxians, romulan, you name the whole STAR TREK universe can be one heck of a game if they really take their time and work it out so that it really become Star Trek Universe and not just a episode feeling.
Also would like to see a real WW2 mmorpg , not like "WW2 Online" but more like BF1942 style graphics with every mmorpg feature possible, meaning all sorts of ranks(duh!) and their are many proffesions that can be taken. So this isn't really about races but i think it can also make a difference if people are getting tired of fantasy based mmorpg, tho you might also have those that are sick of WW2 games, but i think that terrain is still hardly touch in the sence of transforming it into a reall mmorpg.
As for Fantasy based games i really think its the game engine that limits races, if you look at regular single player games you hardly get to play anything else then either :Human, Cars, Mechs, they are basic structures and easy to implement and give body to for a game, for now we have to do with the Boss/Creatures that look complex but are game controled, but i do believe in time they will be able to let us play more complex kind of creatures/machines or anything that comes to mind. Technoligy has come a long way and isn't stopping yet, i bet in 5/10 years from now we get to play games we can not even imagin would be possible
I miss my tonk, with her tail spikes...it's just a skin, why would that bring additional balance issues? If you can balance elves, dorfs, goblins, and hoomans, why would adding an additional race make it more difficult? Most racial traits in the games I've played haven't been even close to character-breaking. At best they're a mild buff that only applies in certain situations.
I really liked playing a char whose only hoomanoid characteristic was the ability to walk upright.
Humans are obsessed with aesthetics. Using WoW as an example, most people would rather play a pretty race such as a human or night elf than an ugly race such as a troll or tauren. That's one reason why you get more Allies (the other being the whole "some people are attracted to good/some people are attracted to evil" thing).
Also, I agree, racial abilities that are extremely unique or overpowering tend to create balance issues.
Personally, I'm all for unique races, as long as they have two legs and walk upright.
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Final Fantasy 7
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...but time flows like a river...
...and history repeats...
-Leader of "The Fighting Irish" in DAoC on Hib/Kay-
Heh, that post acually got me to laugh out loud. You do make a good point, but since it isn't being developed by blizzard, sony, EA or NCsoft the majority of the MMO community are in deneil about its exsistence.
Pretty simplistic debate. Czerkaski wants non-primatial or even non-mammalian races because he sees any humanoid as 'just a weird human', seemingly ignorant of the lifetimes of research and development behind these archetypes and their firm validity on so many levels. He argues in favour of ridiculous new races like an eight year old draws monsters. 'Look! It's cool and creative and has artistic merit because it has a claw on its head for no reason! Also, it speaks Klingon and has four sexes. I have absolutely no actual thought behind this, no idea how it would evolve, live, think, mate, build, grow, or what it exists for at all, but it looks damn cool, doesn't it?'
Anyone who thinks that the deeply defined races of mediaeval fantasy are uncreative and that the use of them is 'lazy', yet somehow thinks that talking moles or spiders are creative additions... I would like to disembowel with a non-stick plastic cooking spoon.
I am not a traditionalist. I advocate anything but mortal stagnation. I do not stick with Elves and Men because they are the way things have always been done. I do it because they are strong archetypes with extremely worthwhile premises, distinct cultures, psychological dichotomies and antithetical aesthetics. I'm sorry, but it is the people who suggest races such as Czerkaski pines over who seem to be the uncreative ones. They are gung-ho about spastically creating things for the sake of creating them, but the reason or worth of creating them seems completely irrelevant in their thought processes. They seem in favour of going about the creation of races like a game of Mad Libs.
Heh, that post acually got me to laugh out loud. You do make a good point, but since it isn't being developed by blizzard, sony, EA or NCsoft the majority of the MMO community are in deneil about its exsistence.
What? Sony isn't making the game?! OMGWTFBBQ this d@*& game!
Ok, sarcasism has reached critical mass, but in all honesty, there is this little thing on this website called the GAME LIST! Take a moment and look through it once in a while.
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...but time flows like a river...
...and history repeats...
-Leader of "The Fighting Irish" in DAoC on Hib/Kay-
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I'm all for unique, non-humanoid races.
The idea of a spider-beast being able to take on half a dozen or so humans is a good one, that sort of dynamic opens up a lot of different avenues for content.
Devs could take note of the systems used in tabletop wargames, where each unit has a 'points cost'. Overall balance could be achieved if each race was assigned a cap of how many 'points' could be online on a server at any given time. For example, if a spider-beast can take on six humans, then the server should be able to 'hold' six times as many humans as it can spider-beasts.
I think devs are too concerned with making things 'fair' on an individual basis (always irritates me when the need for 'game balance' makes an ogre the same as a human barring +1 strength and -1 intellignece, or similar). They need to start thinking of more dynamic ways to acheive balance than individual power.
Of course, the problem with introducing races which aren't equal, is that a good portion of players would gravitate towards the percieved 'strongest' race, which would naturally need to be the most limited one. So a large number of players would possibly be left unable to play their favoured race (or stuck in a queue waiting their turn).
Perhaps we need to change our ways as players too, before we can ask for more variety from the devs.
And to round of with a question: What would happen if we were given a 'sandbox' environment, with imbalanced races (no pop caps), and the possibility for one race to 'win'. Would we see the most imbalanced race triumph time after time, or do you think there would be enough players looking for a challenge to even things up (after the first couple of routs at least)?
EDIT: Just checked out Atriarch's site. Kinda has both sides of the argument in one. On the one hand, they aren't traditional races. On the other, four of the five are two-armed, two-legged (in other words, humanoid). I suspect the fifth plays as if it was, and that choosing a race will remain mostly cosmetic in that game too. I think we need to go further, different races should give a different game experience, rather than what we have now, the same experience in a different skin.
Why would a spider with 6 swords automatically have the upper hand against a shield and sword?
I am sorry, but if you try to be realist for 1 moment, all it take is 1 blow to win. Having 6 weapons only mean that your opponent can't play defensive. But a berserking viking could easily charge, use it shield to block most of the attacks and drive his axe into the skull of the fiend.
In a system with hps and very long fights, yes having more weapons would grant you an automatic victory, but it isn't realist...and it isn't fun. A viking who charge a 6 armed abomination can kill it, 1 shot. Now I don't say we have to make it 1 shot, but we have to make sure it remain interesting. I have nothing against an appealing and interesting system, but if you are automatically going to give the victory to abominations, I won't find this appealing, nor interesting. Unless there is something else to justify it...such as lives per month, where a spider who lose merely a life or two is out for the month, then sure, it can be fun....but the consequences must be there, otherwise there is no reasons to play the weaker side. Each side must be appealing...and honestly, I rather see humans always have a strong role in the MMOs, even if I nearly never play them myself.
I have no problems with a race wearing no armor and having a huge offense bonus, but you have to make sure the game remain interesting, a berserker is all in the offense, it would make no sense that you end up with a 1 way fight between two players sharing the same role, melee-offense. (even if personnally, I always play defensive vikings/barbarians, 95% of them are offensive bastards)
- "If I understand you well, you are telling me until next time. " - Ren
Heh, that post acually got me to laugh out loud. You do make a good point, but since it isn't being developed by blizzard, sony, EA or NCsoft the majority of the MMO community are in deneil about its exsistence.
What? Sony isn't making the game?! OMGWTFBBQ this d@*& game!
Ok, sarcasism has reached critical mass, but in all honesty, there is this little thing on this website called the GAME LIST! Take a moment and look through it once in a while.
Is Atriarch ever going to actually get released though? Its been in development for almost 8 years...
Also, these are Role playing games... and face it... many people role play by identifying with their characters. Give the choice, many gamers chose to play humans, and the better looking the human the more likely they will play it. There are few female dwarf characters in WoW.... most women wont even consider playing them.... and most men do so only as a joke or to be unique.
Look at WoW's Gnome race...has an obvous advanatage a spell caster... yet many people play human mages/warlocks etc cause they hate the look of gnomes. Heck, Dwarf priests are a better example...almost no reason to play any other race.... yet there are more Night Elf priests out there... for athestic reasons only.
It would be interesting to see Starcraft become an MMO, just so we could see how many folks would enjoy playing on the side of the Zerg....
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Most races these days play the same, except for perhaps some stat differences and different starting cities. Not really significant imho. Your better off doing a COH deal and just let people mod their differences with the character creator.
I think they want to increase the play styles difference by making the races different in how they play. This of course would mean having a more complicated world.
A spider race might have 4 arms (i think it might have trouble balancing on only 2 legs), but would be real short and squat. Its vision might be blurry and or very short sighted. It might not feel pain (no hp indicator for you!).
Now all of a sudden the game takes on a real different character.
Of course, all the talk about balance still applies. But i never viewed these games as races to the top, so it worries me less.
Centaur_01: Hey baby, check me out! Half-man, half horse! (wiggles eyebrows suggestively)
anyone remember a game that was made 20 years ago called Wizardry: Crusaders of the Dark Savant, it was re-released with better graphics as Wizardry Gold. The game gave you your basic fantasy races but then also gave you Lizardmen, Faerie, Dracon (half-man, half-dragon), Rawulf (humanoid dogs), Felpurr (humanoid cats) and Mook (looked like a Wookie). It was quiet original for it's time, and built a great atmostphere even for a 2D game. Other original NPC races included Umpani (Rhinoceros men), T'rang (Spider men), and Ratkin (Rat men). It had alot of great content, if brought into an MMO would be quite cool.
I was so dissapointed, especially in comparison to EQ2's latest addition, the Fay. Has wings, can hover (won't die jumping down a cliff), but can't fly, as to not become too overpowered over other races. Now that is fun and different. EQ also has the frog race, but you don't see many playing them. Wonder why - lack of imagination by us players?
It doesn't bother me at all that games keep re-using the standard, traditional, fantasy races. What bothers me is that they keep remaking the same damn shallow, simplistic, linear game over and over again. Grind for levels and loot as you work your way through progressively higher level areas and then spend your time raiding at the end.
I still dream of the "world" mmorpg that makes you feel like your character is living in a fantasy world. As opposed to the currently over-used formula where you follow a predefined path to the "end-game" and then wait for the next expansion or the next new game to come out.
I use to Imm on several MUDs , those weird text based things that surprisingly are still around, lurking in the backwaters.. We had an insect race which had 4 limbs, balanced by the fact it had next to no hitpoints on each one, so yes in battle its offense was great, if you hit it you almost always cut of a limb..was mostly balanced and kinda fun to have to flee from battle carrying your legs in a sack..
The next lot of MMO's seem to be starting to take their influence from the asian myths (a lot of vanguard races look like the Japanese’s spirits etc) as our various cultures mix and class it seems that the next generation may depart somewhat from the Tolkien model. F
or better or for worse..
I think as humans we are taught that having 2 legs and 2 arms and walking upright is the best thing you can be. So its natural for us to assume races that mirror ourselves are "better" than a quadruped or serpent bodied creature..
On a pure work note:
Getting armour and weapons that work with extra arms, snake bodies, four legs means a lot more work has to be done in the game..
I remember when NWN came out they only had rangers with 1 weapon because the overhead of making each model carry the mixture of each weapon meant the overhead was too high. Now I’m sure that new mmo's have a better system than this but even games like Everquest 2 admitted it was having trouble with creating new gear because of the 16+ different models (est) they had to create for each item..
Mylin
If you want players to stay you give them a world that they can live in, and don't limit what they can and cannot do. Most importantly the players and the producers have to remember that if there is an "end-game" then there's also an ending of the interest. Get to level 1000 and you're done, no more player, no more revenue.
Its the closest you are ever going to get... Unless SpiderRiders Online comes.