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General: New Column: Outside the Box
Stradden
Managing EditorMember CommonPosts: 6,696
Today marks is the first of a new weekly column from our News Editor Garrett Fuller. Each week, Fuller will highlight new innovations in MMO gaming as well as smaller games that you may not be so familiar with.
Welcome to our new column here at MMORPG.com called Outside the Box. Being that this is the first week we'll be running things I wanted to take the chance to talk a little about what the column will offer and how the readers can get involved. The goal of this column is to try to bring information about games that are not necessarily in the public eye. Also, more than anything else we want to look at games, whether they are major releases or smaller independent games, which will be bringing something new to the MMO table. I hope this column will help developers and players find information and share ideas about how to take the standard MMO game play into new and unique areas for all of us to enjoy.
Read the column here.
Cheers,
Jon Wood
Managing Editor
MMORPG.com
Comments
Nice ! A column which has the potential to give us the lowdown on truly new concepts out there. Can I turn in my Massive Magazine back for credit now ?:P
Don't let Cindy read that post
Interesting concept, but as mentioned by others, finding material for a weekly column might be tough, especially since new innovation and MMO doesn't really go together. But good luck and I look forward to reading it.
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
"I need to finish" - Christian Wolff: The Accountant
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
If any upcoming game is thinking Out of the Box, then its The Chronicles of Spellborn.
www.tcos.com
It has a combat system thats very different from the current EQ2/WoW autoattack&press for skill system.
Also, its a fantasy setting, but a complete original one. No elfs or dwarves there.
I could go on for a while how much TCOS fits Outside the Box perfectly, but I have to keep it short. Check it out.
Hope we are wrong and the industry supplies this column with tons of fuel. I predict we see Saga of Ryzom's player created content system spotlighted here.
Just a Fool,
Ivan
ROFL !!!
I guess great minds think alike Nathan
!!
I think there's plenty of good material out there for this column. If it isn't based on everything being a completely original idea, but instead looking more closely at ideas that have been introduced that are less conventional and what they contribute to the MMORPG genre, then there should be no end of subject matter out there.
I hope there's at least one article about EVE and it's "out of the box" methods. Then again they've probably all been covered several times by now.
I'm sure we'll see a column about AoC's combat system and perhaps on WAR's Public Quest system. I'm looking forward to this column. It'll be nice to read about innovations in the gaming world.
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I live to fight, and fight to live.
I would like to see some discussion of radical departures from the 'box' that contains most mmo games on the market and in development at this time. Things that go beyond levels and stats and different races. One of my favorite topics of discussion is Dynamic Worlds or Virtual Online Worlds and the ENDLESS possibilities that lie in that area. Perhaps this will be the featured topic at some point.
IronOre - Forging the Future
Their combat system I think revolutionizes MMO fights and the fact that you can wear any weapon or armor you think looks the coolest. The stats are gathered from sigils that are added to an item afterwards.
For IvanTheFool:
Well sadly this setting of traders, outlaws and bounty hunters is already there.
Not sure if Dragon Empires is an older one though. Anyway the game is Silkroad online, a free-to-play mmo where you have traders who make money by transporting items. You have thiefs who make their living by killing these traders and stealing their caravans. And then the bounty hunters try to hunt the thiefs, maybe hired by traders to guard their fortune.
Chronicles of Spellborn, still in Beta, is an excellent choics as a topdown innovative game. Would also like to recommend two other games for a looksee:
Underlight- one the ancient great MMOs where all the action were in your dreams and the monsters you fought were various kinds of nightmares.
A Tale in the Desert- truely one fo the most innovate creative games of the past 20 years. A must see, must study, must play for all aspiring game designers.
Good luck with your new series Garrett, always enjoy reading your columns!
Roe R Adams, III
Love the column idea, and I can't wait.
I also have to agree that The Chronicles of Spellborn should be one of the topics some time. The game takes a lot of interesting turns in areas that most games shove aside and say "Bleh, they already have a system, clone it". The combat, character creation, and the like are definitely original.
Good luck with the column!
(\_/)
(O.o)
(> <) This is Bunny. Copy Bunny into your signature to help him on his way to world domination!
Randomly coming up with new crap just to say you're "different" is as far away from genuine creativity as it is possible to get. Calling something a "Glipnorp" (or whatever), giving it octagonal ears (or whatever) and making it thrifty and good with switchblades (or whatever) is puerile nonsense unless it ADDS something to the gameplay.
At the very least we're familiar with Elves, Dwarves, etc. Or, better yet, humans.
You want a truely original idea? How about this: just have ONE race but make it the best it can possibly be. Instead of twenty animations for each of ten races, make 200 different animations for the one type of MOB I'm going to be looking at 100 times more than any other in the game. Instead of making each piece of equipment morph to fit ten wildly different body types, make it look really, really good on ONE!
Seriously, who out there would look at the best animations in the world and say, "Nah; I won't play unless I can be an Elf... or a Troll... or a Glipnorp, or whatever?"
OK, a handful of whinebots might SAY something that asinine, but even they won't actually follow through on their idiotic "threat" to withhold their hard-earned $15.00 a month.
I, for one, will be interested in reading what developers are thinking up and various innovative aspects about different games.
Which Final Fantasy Character Are You?
Final Fantasy 7
I played Vanguard Beta and I'll have to say that the Diplomacy system is excellendt, and it had me forgetting all the hack and slash while I was doing it, Many hours of forgotten hack and slash.
I played Vanguard Beta and I'll have to say that the Diplomacy system is excellendt, and it had me forgetting all the hack and slash while I was doing it, Many hours of forgotten hack and slash.
Please.. the same could have been said for Vanguard up until resently..
Anywho I like this 'outside the box' thing however as most people are demintrating 'the masses' don't want inerventivity as long as games like WoW coninue to feed their epeen sadly leaving the rest of the market streched between these other titles.
Games like Vanguard and TCoS do have what this market needs a new twist in the current format of MMOing,
In the case of Vanguard Sigil looked at the market and saw these games just throwing themselfs into the 'instenced end-game' as WoW 'has' the 8 million playerbase so the profitable option looks like 'do a WoW', Sigil took a gamble and said 'lets make a world not a hub with dungeon bubbles' and from some players point of view it's paid off but from many others (ie 'the masses') as the game is so large it takes a toll on the players PC making it less 'acessabile' then what they have been used to therefore instanstly deeming the game bad because their 5 year old pc can't handle of 'moden day' game, a game which irronically has near enough the same quality as their console title if the pc can handle the maximum settings, something which they would buy purly on that basis. The Diplomacy system also one hell of a great item in the game along with the crafting system having their own level bracket, great ideas, it's realisic, not everyone in the word 'needs' a sword to rule overall, however from a 'gamer' point of view 'combat > all' I can hear in their minds: 'I don't wanna read text and descover WHY the world is what it is, I want big moves so I can beat up players with big effects'. The problem is these days 'the masses' want a game to feel uber in, not a world to be respected in, Vanguard brings back MUDs for us again, but to bring back a MUD style game is to try and make pen and paper D&D look 'cooler' then an Xbox360, too many of the market would rather play a '360' then do 'D&D' it's just not 'cool', WoW is the 'cool jock that everyone wants to hang around with in the school yard' of the MMO world, Vanguard is the 'chess club nerd', people would rather be a jock then be picked on as a nerd.
For TSoC it's a tad different, again with the looming WoW shadow it doesn't have the 'knownness factor', and it is pracically like slapping MMOest stats to an FPS game it's not actally 'new' it's been done before, what IS 'outside the box' for it is it's combat skill system it doesn't allow a player to just run up to another player and hit the 'I win' button it actally requires tactics becuase you have to plan ahead with your skill chains plus adapt to what your oppent throws at you becuase like I said it's not as simple as run up hit kill and run away, they actally know your there and will actally take more then 2 seconds of combat to kill them. The problem with that is that from an FPS point of few usally from my experence players generally go for either the biggest weapon that can kill the most players in the fastest time or the sniper basically the one hit killer without needing to go into combat at all, those players don't like the fair fight they want the win easy, same with a MMO's PVP system why go into the 'fair fight' with a chance to lose or just go into the fight where your most likly to win. I like TCoS' look at this as not matter how many 'big weapons' you have combat always will start off at an even match it's just that can you last out in the fight to use your bigger guns?
Like I said I like this new fechure on MMORPG.com but are 'the masses' wanting games to go outside the box and bring us more complex items or are they just happy with games to pollish off their epeen? People have always said it's 'casuals' VS 'hardcore' but is it really D&D VS the consoles?
Bring on the WARRRRGGHH!
You do know what Vaporware is right? >.>
Vaporware is software or hardware which is announced by a developer well in advance of release, but which then fails to emerge, either with or without a protracted development cycle. The term implies unwarranted optimism, or sometimes even deception; that is, it may imply that the announcer knows that product development is in too early a stage to support responsible statements about its completion date, feature set, or even feasibility.
-wiki encyclopedia
It's obvious you didnt even give The Chronicles of Spellborn a second look if you think its vaporware. For starters, they are quite on schedual with their Beta. Also, as far as I know they haven't announced stuff that they aren't making true. In fact, they dont release information that isnt in the final stages at all.
Let me make a list of out of the box features from TCoS that I can think of out of my head:
-Very creative and original backstory
-A deffinate Out of the Box combat system (Ill ellaborate below.)
-Npc's walk up to you to offer quests instead of other way around.
-Good gear has nothing to do with the looks of the gear. (A lowly lvl has good looks. Basically you can let your character look how you want and upgrade the gear depending on your level with upgrading slots and such.)
-Fantasy mmorpg, yet no elves!
The combat system consists of two things. An FPS-like pointer in the middle of the screen that has to target the monster/player you want to hit. (Its not first-done in a rpg, there's been a different rpg who had that idea.) There is no auto-attack. Furthermore, to determine what attacks you do and special abilities you use, you have to pre-set multiple skillbars.
As soon as you use a skill on your skillbar, it turns to the next skillbar. You then can only use the skills on your second skillbar, and so on. I think there are up to 10 different skillbars. Basically you have to think ahead before the combat starts on how you make your "skill deck". There are also combo skills which you can place on the different skillbars to create combo attacks.
Im not sure if I explained the tcos combat system clearly, but there are good explenations available on the web.
I'd like to see player made content. Player GM's who can create adventures like the single player games. Mmorpg mods if you will.
Multiple ruleset servers to fit different playstyles. Group and raid only servers. Group and solo only servers. Classic servers. Player created servers. After a few months only the most popular servers get to stay up. Let the players innovate and let the player market decide which servers they like for it's rulesets. It doesn't have to be like the Wild West but have the devs setup guidelines and let the players run with it.
I'd like to see a Guild Wars set in a persistent world and I'd pay monthly for it. Mmorpgs are just scratching the surface of what can be done.
Spiritglow