Twitch-based doesn't have to be first person shooters. NPCs would be dynamic and have advanced AI, and can be used for many different purposes. And I don't see how there's a difference between paying a monthly fee to engage in turn-based combat and paying to engage in real-time combat. The fees have nothing to do with the type of gameplay it is, the fee goes towards the server that allows you to be able to play in a persistent world with thousands of other players in that same world.
I was simply saying that if you want:
1. twitch-based
2. pvp
3. dependence on player skill vs character skill
then a FPS already does those things, and you don't have to pay a monthly fee (unless you rent a clan server).
Personally, I detest twitch-based MMOs. I also think there's more to "player skill" than fast reactions. And fast reactions is mainly what these kinds of games boil down to.
Secondly, I still have no idea what you mean by "dynamic NPCs with advanced AI". You still haven't told me what function they'd have in your game.
Twitch-based doesn't have to be first person shooters. NPCs would be dynamic and have advanced AI, and can be used for many different purposes. And I don't see how there's a difference between paying a monthly fee to engage in turn-based combat and paying to engage in real-time combat. The fees have nothing to do with the type of gameplay it is, the fee goes towards the server that allows you to be able to play in a persistent world with thousands of other players in that same world.
I was simply saying that if you want:
1. twitch-based
2. pvp
3. dependence on player skill vs character skill
then a FPS already does those things, and you don't have to pay a monthly fee (unless you rent a clan server).
Personally, I detest twitch-based MMOs. I also think there's more to "player skill" than fast reactions. And fast reactions is mainly what these kinds of games boil down to.
Secondly, I still have no idea what you mean by "dynamic NPCs with advanced AI". You still haven't told me what function they'd have in your game.
Player-skill doesn't just involve reflexes, it also involves management skills, tactics, strategy, multitasking, critical thinking, etc. Just because the combat is in real-time, doesn't mean there are no attributes, skills, items and statistical analysis.
Also, a multiplayer FPS game is not the same as an MMO game with real time combat. MMOs have vast, seamless persistent worlds, complex/dynamic evolving characters, economy, diplomacy, politics, countless items, structures and vehicles/mounts and social interaction. It's a living breathing universe, whereas multiplayer FPS games are just repetitive rounds of mindless mayhem.
All those things you described above, can exist whether you choose to have NPC-given objectives or not. So, anyhow, good luck with getting your game made. Sounds a bit like Darkfall, actually. But I know with the lack of beta and other concrete details, DF is considered by many as Vapourware...
All those things you described above, can exist whether you choose to have NPC-given objectives or not. So, anyhow, good luck with getting your game made. Sounds a bit like Darkfall, actually. But I know with the lack of beta and other concrete details, DF is considered by many as Vapourware...
There are numerous MMOs that fit the criteria other than Darkfall. Fallen Earth, Jumpgate Evolution, and Neocron to name a few.
I agree with alot of people here...I want dynamic, it really sucks every quest you do has the same outcome as everyone else, and has zero effect on the game world. Not to mention there is so little variation with quests in MMOs, its the exact same "kill x no of creatures" or "deliver this piece of junk to my friend over there" with a variation of landscape and monsters....its tiring...so many are tired of this now. MMOs can be so much more. Time to move on. Offer quests where we have to siege castles, naval combat, run towns or start some epic invastion or whatever. Surprise the player a bit, make the quests really exciting, involved, awesome! Make the player feel like they are really making some sort of impact. Easier said then done naturally....but stop copying EQ/ WoW god-dammit , especially if you aren't going to bother to improving the flaws in those games! lol. /rant.
I never complain at quests, or camps...unless I am lost and not understanding them.
Which seldom happen cause games with such a focus on complexity, will not baby feed you an easy intro to later pull such a complex thing on you, they will start with a slightly less complex intro, go to a chapter 1 of heavy complexity, a chapter 2 of inextricable complexity will follow and chapter 3 will feature a doomsday type of complexity...at any rate, I don't play past the intro unless there is an outside the game reason to make me play.
Again, I never, ever, complain at quest...or at camps in MMOs.
- "If I understand you well, you are telling me until next time. " - Ren
I'd also like to see quests/work randomized and dynamic (screw handcrafted lore in annoying little text boxes) so that it's unpredictable, and you aren't doing the exact same thing as everyone else. So if a princess does need saving, it's because a random NPC approaches your character, and your character alone, making the quest a special opportunity.
Computers don't make very good GMs. The only thing they can change is numbers. So yes, you could have the computer vary mob HP, mob damage, mob model, mob colour... those basic things.
What you have described above is not that. If you want each player to experience unique opportunities, you have to have designers working all day on one-shot only content. The computer cannot make content like that on the fly. I promise you.
So on one hand you say "screw hand crafted content" and on the other "give players unique experiences". Unfortunately, you can't have both.
You don't necessary need to create the so-call "one-shot" only content. You could design, say 150 different unique quests format, and as players unlock a certain quests, the computer randomly choose from the 150 forms of quest and pick out one. This does offer a certain uniqueness in the quests that players are doing, and at the same time not put the developers on a path where they have to keep making "quests" to satisfy the players.
(This is just a part of what I think quest system is like. Becuase I separate the idea of the mundane tasks (kill x creature, bring back y item) as missions/tasks, and uses another system to handle such.)
Do you mean like the EVE mission/storyline system? Because that gets fairly generic. Its nice and its useful and it infinite. And it offers missions of various types. But it doesn't take that long to get all the kill missions down or whatever. And usually people interested in kill missions avoid, say, courier missions.
It has its advantages but I think most people admit it starts to get repetitive. Even though its not usually kill 10 guristas and is encounter based, you still see the pattern.
True, which is why I suggested it be more like an opportunity the game presents at random, rather than being something players can grind out, doing over and over. Obviously, it would have to be something on the side to mix things up, not an element of core gameplay. I don't like the idea of questing as core gameplay at all, anyhow. No matter what you do, it'd become repetitive, which is antithetical to what questing is supposed to be.
Which is why I mention being a solider in a militia fighting waves of orcs in a war, as opposed to a special ops guy who goes in to kill the ever respawning orc leader - just makes way more sense to grind on something like the former than the latter. One fits in with the idea of repetition, and being done by lots of players, and the other doesn't.
Also, as far as piecing together interlocking quest components goes, it's something that can always be added to and built on. It worked ok in old games like Daggerfall, it can work far better now, and can always be improved even more, just by adding more components and randomization. It just goes against the modern trend of trying to handcraft everything, which I think is really the wrong way to go, especially in an MMO, where content needs to be repeated so much.
Some people think better questing means more handholding through elaborate lavishly crafted storyline, each quest being like a single-player game in itself, and yeah, that hopeless. I think it's a bad idea to even try moving in that direction, as any sort of core gameplay element in an MMO. You just end up with all sorts of crappy instancing, where players don't care about the story, because it doesn't even exist in the shared gameworld, in a game that's less and less of an MMO. On top of all that, it just ends up being repetitive and monotonous, anyhow.
When I want a single-player story, I'll play a single-player game. When I play an MMO, I want a massively multiplayer world.
the sad part is that runescape does have better quests than quite a few MMO's. guildwars has some interesting story quests, and normal quests.
I don't like quests in guildwars. they are all basically kill this mob, go here and kill these mobs on your way. but then the game is basically pure combat - so not much else they could be.
runescape had very few kill x quests. granted alot of them where dull for other reasons, but some where good - dessert treasure is prolly the most fun quests i've played yet.
quest in wow are dullest, but at least you can share them which can make them bearable.
Someone already touched upon this earlier in the thread with reference to UO- there is absolutely no need for quests when you are playing alongside thousands of other human beings. Given the right tools, options, and instigating factors for player on player interaction; (be it conflict or camaraderie) there is a potentially endless amount of unrepetitive and enjoyable experiences to be had.
Quests are dinosaurs. Single player, 2-D, top-down, relics of the offline era and they are no longer relevant. They're simply easy for designers to cling to as a crutch and wonderful for keeping people who don't know any better paying their monthly sub-fees.
When Microsoft or Sony finally makes a mini-PC-for-idiots "console" that not only has the power but the peripherals to support MMOwhatever- only then will you see an open-ended sandbox game; and it will put the quest driven garbage of this era to shame in sales.
Such a game would do well now if it stood a chance in hell of first being made. People love to point fingers towards the UO exodus when Everquest materialized and OSI's trammel concession... BUT THAT WAS NEARLY A DECADE AGO! HELLO!?
Less than a million people combined played any sort of MMOanything. The ones who were playing came from very particular sectors of PC gamers who were more similar to one another than they'd like to think. (read: Nerds) The MMO biz is now as big any other stupid American fad and people from wide backgrounds are now playing... the resounding majority of which only coming aboard in the past few years. Quest based games are all they've ever known.
The point is there's really no telling whether a modern-day "Ultima Online" type game would beat the living shit out of it's modern-day "Everquest" counterpart.... Given the popularity of conflict-centric reality television shows, competitive sports, and online shooters on consoles- I'd say modern-day UO would kick modern-day EQ's ass.
Such a thought makes the carebears who have been burning through content for the past 10 years, moving from game to game like a parasitic cancer ever since EQ, shudder in horror. Waiting such a long time to see them "get theirs" (I'm one of those nerds from 1998, one of the cool ones ) makes me enthusiastically await their perpetual misery when quest-based games are pulled off life-support... so I'm just a teency bit biased...
Hope you got your things together. Hope you are quite prepared to die. Looks like we're in for nasty weather. ... There's a bad moon on the rise.
I'm sure someone has already mentioned this, in one way or another, but MMO "quests" are shallow and trivial for 2 reasons:
1) They take place in a static world
2) They're scripted
Completing a quest never really effects the game world in any significant way. You just killed 10 wolves so NPC #21 in village #12 can make clothes for everyone. Great. You got some xp, some money, and maybe some gear. Unfortunately, nothing really changed. NPC #21 is still standing in village #12 giving out the exact same quest to every single player that comes through.
Predictability is another issue. When you get a scripted quest you're not walking into a dynamic encounter, you're walking into a script. This happens here, then that happens there, then this guys pops up. If you've gone through the quest once, you never really want to do it again, because you know exactly whats gonna happen. No wonder devs have such a hard time keeping up with "content". It's all single-serving, dispossable content.
I agree completely. It's funny reading posts about how 'NPCs should be more human!'. MMOs already have plenty of humans, so why the need for NPCs?
You want to effect the world? Give the players the tools to create the world and 'dynamic quests' WILL come. Eventually someone will want to build a Castle or somesuch and he'll need people to get materials, people to defend his work, hell, people to assist with the work as he couldn't possibly do it on his own. He'll need people to haul the materials in from far away, which means more people to escort the haulers because there's bound to be robbers along the trail. He'll need crafters to create all the stone for the castle. Then what about when someone else decides she wants to knock his castle down? You can see where I'm going here.
Sure you don't get xp or items but you help built a castle and probably an empire! You're not just using some castle that was placed there by game designers, it's YOUR castle. Even if it is just a game, it has some meaning to you. I think that's a hell of a lot more fun than doing quests for NPCs.
Excellent post goneglockin. I agree completely. It's funny reading posts about how 'NPCs should be more human!'. MMOs already have plenty of humans, so why the need for NPCs? You want to effect the world? Give the players the tools to create the world and 'dynamic quests' WILL come. Eventually someone will want to build a Castle or somesuch and he'll need people to get materials, people to defend his work, hell, people to assist with the work as he couldn't possibly do it on his own. He'll need people to haul the materials in from far away, which means more people to escort the haulers because there's bound to be robbers along the trail. He'll need crafters to create all the stone for the castle. Then what about when someone else decides she wants to knock his castle down? You can see where I'm going here. Sure you don't get xp or items but you help built a castle and probably an empire! You're not just using some castle that was placed there by game designers, it's YOUR castle. Even if it is just a game, it has some meaning to you. I think that's a hell of a lot more fun than doing quests for NPCs.
there are already a few MMO's that have this.
I find it amazing that by 2020 first world countries will be competing to get immigrants.
First, I need to explain that for me, a quest is synonymous with a "long term goal". Thus, I don't view "kill X", "collect x" or "heal x" as quests.
So here is a typical definition of something I would call a quest. Say they is a faction of criminals lead by a evil dragon (yes, very cliche, but bear with me). Killing the dragon on its own would require a team effort, and would likely drop some nice items. You could do this anytime as long as you could physically get to him and kill him.
However, he would also be part of a long quest to destroy the entire organisation. So early in the quest you would capture a footsoldier, then interrogate a spy, defeat a regiment, capture a general, etc, etc. The final step would still be killing the dragon, but this would complete the quest and provide additional reward than just the dragon loot. This is typically why quests exist: to provide a succession of objectives, and additional reward for completing all of them.
Now, with quests this is very easy. At each stage of the quest, you report back to the city guard, and receive your next set of instructions. Without quests, you have two options as I see it:
1. Have every step reward the player with some sort of drop, which tradeskillers must combine to provide the final reward to the player. Problems? Well yes, how do you inform the players that all these items are part of something bigger?
2. Flag the character every time he kills one of these mobs, and "poof" the reward into his inventory when he completes all required encounters. Problems? Yes, the problems are obvious.
Or you decide not to reward players for completing a series of goals at all. You treat each mob individually, and only reward the player with items that each mob drops on its own. No series of objectives, and no overall reward.
That's my question. My logic is this:
A. Completing all the objectives is more difficult than completing a few of them.
B. Rewards can exist for 100% completion additional to individual encounter rewards.
C. Without quests, you have to rely on tradeskill drops or simple character flags.
D. The methods in C. are less intuitive/ logical than relating tasks to players via quests, and would probably lead to increased reliance on cheat sites. Plus, these are almost like quests anyhow.
E. Scrapping multiple-stage objectives would serve little purpose, except to make the game less cohesive.
Originally posted by gestalt11 Originally posted by Godliest The usual fetch X quests doesn't actually have any connection to anything and doesn't feel logical. Why would this person ask you to go and fetch 10 pumpkins for no reason at all?I would prefer logical quests that ask you to go "slay the Dinosaurs at the farm" and then you get there and see that the place is already cleaned out so you return and say "I slaughtered the dinosaurs" and then you finish the quest. How does the person know it was you who did it anyway?Quests with connection to the storyline and push it forward is also funnier to play as it feels like you do something that actually has some kind of impact on the world.
But that is why they force to to collect heads. Of course I still haven't figured out why only every 5th guy has a head. They must be zombies!
Or the fact that the spider with 6 eyes only have one you can loot every 10th kill...
No but seriously. Why should they ask you to collect heads? It's not like they got anything to do with them and they don't really care as long as you've seen to it that the farm is clean of dinosaurs. No matter how you did it's only the fact that you've completed the objective that matters.
Here's why "kill X monster" quests are dull: you know where the monster is, you only have to kill them 1 at a time, and killing one isn't hard. Add to that, that when you've killed your X monsters, the quest is done. You can't get much more boring than that.
In EQ, a typical quest went like this: Find an NPC. Talk to him for a bit. Supply him with a muffin or two. Listen to his predicament (you had to listen, there was no dialog box where you could just click "next" until it said "quest journal updated"...), and work out where he was sending you (you didn't always know where you had to go).
Then you'd have to find an evil gnoll or something. But he wasn't out in the open, and he wasn't always around at all. Sometimes he'd be in zone A, sometimes in zone B. Sometimes you'd have to "spawn" him by using your knowledge of his placeholders to trigger him. Since he'd normally be at a dangerous point in the zone, you'd have to clear your way to him, hold the area (dealing with respawns), and make sure you could take him with any additional mobs who might come wandering past.
After you'd killed him and collected his head/ sword/ key/ whatever, you'd return to the original NPC, only to learn that you'd just scratched the surface of a much larger quest. You'd be sent to some other dungeons, with tougher monsters, to find rarer and rarer mobs and artifacts.
Those were real quests. But EQ was not a game where quests could be used to level up. Quests kept you entertained - gave you the bigger picture - while you leveled up. Today, so-called-quests are different. They are there to provide an alternative to mob grinding. In fact, it is called quest grinding.
So there you have it. Either you can have large, epic EQ style quests which do not help you level up, or you can have today's grinding quests which exist purely to give you an XP boost.
The usual fetch X quests doesn't actually have any connection to anything and doesn't feel logical. Why would this person ask you to go and fetch 10 pumpkins for no reason at all? I would prefer logical quests that ask you to go "slay the Dinosaurs at the farm" and then you get there and see that the place is already cleaned out so you return and say "I slaughtered the dinosaurs" and then you finish the quest. How does the person know it was you who did it anyway? Quests with connection to the storyline and push it forward is also funnier to play as it feels like you do something that actually has some kind of impact on the world.
But that is why they force to to collect heads. Of course I still haven't figured out why only every 5th guy has a head. They must be zombies!
Or the fact that the spider with 6 eyes only have one you can loot every 10th kill...
No but seriously. Why should they ask you to collect heads? It's not like they got anything to do with them and they don't really care as long as you've seen to it that the farm is clean of dinosaurs. No matter how you did it's only the fact that you've completed the objective that matters.
Well if you want the real answer its because these games are not made to be stateful. They are a completely static imagining of these so-called worlds.
And this is also why the quests tend to be generic.
Some people here are lamenting the streamling and quicking of quests. But all the things they thought were cool are also barriers to enjoyment for others. The current state of quests as far as quick and not too arduous, ie. what WoW. Is exactly because that is what most people want out of them.
But the genericness is due to both the need for simplicity and the fact that these game are completely static. There is no state, the farm is never clear. It is always in a state of generating enemies. Basically its hell. The denizens of these lands are forever being tormented and you can never truly help them.
Loaded Elder Scrolls Oblivion up over the weekend, and realized how night and day quests are in that game versus your typical MMO.
Here are just a few ideas:
1. Class-specific quests that require you to use your class's unique talents/abilities. As a warrior, let me take a quest where I need to patrol a merchant's house and fight off a team of intruders from the Thieves Guild. As a thief, let me break into the merchant's house and steal his prized amulet instead.
2. Quests that involve mysteries or puzzles. Some of my favorite Oblivion quests have to do with solving a murder or theft by gathering clues instead of simply beating people over the head.
3. Allow players to make meaningful moral choices. Obilivion does this very well - kill an innocent NPC and you're going to have a bounty on your head. But on the plus side you could be recruited into the Dark Brotherhood. Tabula Rasa also offers "moral" dilemmas, only there's no punishment or reward for being a drug-running, murdering SOB.
Yes, I know not everything can be recreated from a single player RPG to an MMOG environment. But thanks to instancing I think more and more can be done to move away from the "go collect 25 more bat eye" style quests.
Well, just my 2 cents. Most examples given by people here draw a bridge between MMOrpg and JUSTrpg. That's just not right. "Quests" in it's classic meaning should not even exist in a MMO. Because MMO (well, "good" MMO, game, where all letters in word MMORPG have a meaning and sense) centers on interaction of real humans, not human and NPCs. Just for example - small, very small part of what I'm talking about could be found in EVE. For example - ability to place bounties on other players if they do something evil. You see pirate, you see bounty on him, you kill him, you get the money. How that's not a quest? The system could be much more complex and deep, given proper game mechanics. If you could center your gamplay on bounty hunting, have some mechanics to find, track and ambush "bad guys"... The "base" of this "quest" is always the same, but given human factor - many hunts will and must be different. The example with building a castle goes this way too. The main problem is that ALL todays MMOs are far from being true MMORPGs. They are mostly brainless diablo-clones with persistent worldsservers, nothing more. So nice MMORPG-quests are just question of genre evolving to next level... though I doubt it will come in a near future... if it will come at all xD
PS. Can you even imagine a MMO with absolutely NO mobs or other NPCs? Thought so
I think many players want a feeling of individuality, that their character and experiences are like no other, in a good way.
Playing a single player game this is easier, there are no other people so anything you do it seems like you are the only one doing it, until you talk to others online, then your adventure seems more common place and you seem like a faceless person in many.
Whenever you put a story or quests in an online game, you are setting the populace up to have the air knocked out of their sails right off the bat, it is blatantly obvious that you are all doing the same thing. Not having quests or a story helps a bit, but you still realize that whatever you have done, so have others and many times.
Really you are confronted with this notion that no matter what you do you are not special, different and important in anyway. Yeah not saying that people are seeking meaning in video games, but it probably doesn't help that the real world is just as empty and meaningless as games are, so no wonder people are always looking to get away then becoming dissapointed when it is too close to home.
Don't you worry little buddy. You're dealing with a man of honor. However, honor requires a higher percentage of profit
I'd like to see quests that for once have a permanent impact on the world.
In an MMO it would require instancing but it would be great to raze the evil wizard's tower and have it stay burnt down for good. If you do a quest to eliminate a band of thieves blocking the road I don't want to see them respawn 5 minutes later. It makes the quest seem pointless.
Even in wow there where some quests i liked, becouse most where dull quest, these where a very enjoyable quest chain.
First one was that linken sword quest that secret quest in ungaro in that little lake a long chain of quest i love it.
And that very long quest from fallenhero by entrance blasted lands was also a great quest chain.
Ive only play wow in first year of his launch so dunno if later where more quests like these, but even tho i dont like wow this is what i remember i liked in that game these long quests where you needed to do alot travel alot and even had to collect items to craft something, to contuing further.
I like quest where you need to do alot travel alot find out things and where parts are solo or in party, have to craft or all kinds of things that make such a quest enjoyable and fun:).
You had many of those in morrowind or oblivion even more complex and much more rpg style but you get picture:).
Hope to build full AMD system RYZEN/VEGA/AM4!!!
MB:Asus V De Luxe z77 CPU:Intell Icore7 3770k GPU: AMD Fury X(waiting for BIG VEGA 10 or 11 HBM2?(bit unclear now)) MEMORY:Corsair PLAT.DDR3 1866MHZ 16GB PSU:Corsair AX1200i OS:Windows 10 64bit
Comments
1. twitch-based
2. pvp
3. dependence on player skill vs character skill
then a FPS already does those things, and you don't have to pay a monthly fee (unless you rent a clan server).
Personally, I detest twitch-based MMOs. I also think there's more to "player skill" than fast reactions. And fast reactions is mainly what these kinds of games boil down to.
Secondly, I still have no idea what you mean by "dynamic NPCs with advanced AI". You still haven't told me what function they'd have in your game.
1. twitch-based
2. pvp
3. dependence on player skill vs character skill
then a FPS already does those things, and you don't have to pay a monthly fee (unless you rent a clan server).
Personally, I detest twitch-based MMOs. I also think there's more to "player skill" than fast reactions. And fast reactions is mainly what these kinds of games boil down to.
Secondly, I still have no idea what you mean by "dynamic NPCs with advanced AI". You still haven't told me what function they'd have in your game.
Player-skill doesn't just involve reflexes, it also involves management skills, tactics, strategy, multitasking, critical thinking, etc. Just because the combat is in real-time, doesn't mean there are no attributes, skills, items and statistical analysis.
Also, a multiplayer FPS game is not the same as an MMO game with real time combat. MMOs have vast, seamless persistent worlds, complex/dynamic evolving characters, economy, diplomacy, politics, countless items, structures and vehicles/mounts and social interaction. It's a living breathing universe, whereas multiplayer FPS games are just repetitive rounds of mindless mayhem.
We've kind of derailed the topic a bit here.
All those things you described above, can exist whether you choose to have NPC-given objectives or not. So, anyhow, good luck with getting your game made. Sounds a bit like Darkfall, actually. But I know with the lack of beta and other concrete details, DF is considered by many as Vapourware...
There are numerous MMOs that fit the criteria other than Darkfall. Fallen Earth, Jumpgate Evolution, and Neocron to name a few.
I agree with alot of people here...I want dynamic, it really sucks every quest you do has the same outcome as everyone else, and has zero effect on the game world. Not to mention there is so little variation with quests in MMOs, its the exact same "kill x no of creatures" or "deliver this piece of junk to my friend over there" with a variation of landscape and monsters....its tiring...so many are tired of this now. MMOs can be so much more. Time to move on. Offer quests where we have to siege castles, naval combat, run towns or start some epic invastion or whatever. Surprise the player a bit, make the quests really exciting, involved, awesome! Make the player feel like they are really making some sort of impact. Easier said then done naturally....but stop copying EQ/ WoW god-dammit
, especially if you aren't going to bother to improving the flaws in those games! lol. /rant.
I never complain at quests, or camps...unless I am lost and not understanding them.
Which seldom happen cause games with such a focus on complexity, will not baby feed you an easy intro to later pull such a complex thing on you, they will start with a slightly less complex intro, go to a chapter 1 of heavy complexity, a chapter 2 of inextricable complexity will follow and chapter 3 will feature a doomsday type of complexity...at any rate, I don't play past the intro unless there is an outside the game reason to make me play.
Again, I never, ever, complain at quest...or at camps in MMOs.
- "If I understand you well, you are telling me until next time. " - Ren
What you have described above is not that. If you want each player to experience unique opportunities, you have to have designers working all day on one-shot only content. The computer cannot make content like that on the fly. I promise you.
So on one hand you say "screw hand crafted content" and on the other "give players unique experiences". Unfortunately, you can't have both.
You don't necessary need to create the so-call "one-shot" only content. You could design, say 150 different unique quests format, and as players unlock a certain quests, the computer randomly choose from the 150 forms of quest and pick out one. This does offer a certain uniqueness in the quests that players are doing, and at the same time not put the developers on a path where they have to keep making "quests" to satisfy the players.
(This is just a part of what I think quest system is like. Becuase I separate the idea of the mundane tasks (kill x creature, bring back y item) as missions/tasks, and uses another system to handle such.)
Do you mean like the EVE mission/storyline system? Because that gets fairly generic. Its nice and its useful and it infinite. And it offers missions of various types. But it doesn't take that long to get all the kill missions down or whatever. And usually people interested in kill missions avoid, say, courier missions.It has its advantages but I think most people admit it starts to get repetitive. Even though its not usually kill 10 guristas and is encounter based, you still see the pattern.
True, which is why I suggested it be more like an opportunity the game presents at random, rather than being something players can grind out, doing over and over. Obviously, it would have to be something on the side to mix things up, not an element of core gameplay. I don't like the idea of questing as core gameplay at all, anyhow. No matter what you do, it'd become repetitive, which is antithetical to what questing is supposed to be.
Which is why I mention being a solider in a militia fighting waves of orcs in a war, as opposed to a special ops guy who goes in to kill the ever respawning orc leader - just makes way more sense to grind on something like the former than the latter. One fits in with the idea of repetition, and being done by lots of players, and the other doesn't.
Also, as far as piecing together interlocking quest components goes, it's something that can always be added to and built on. It worked ok in old games like Daggerfall, it can work far better now, and can always be improved even more, just by adding more components and randomization. It just goes against the modern trend of trying to handcraft everything, which I think is really the wrong way to go, especially in an MMO, where content needs to be repeated so much.
Some people think better questing means more handholding through elaborate lavishly crafted storyline, each quest being like a single-player game in itself, and yeah, that hopeless. I think it's a bad idea to even try moving in that direction, as any sort of core gameplay element in an MMO. You just end up with all sorts of crappy instancing, where players don't care about the story, because it doesn't even exist in the shared gameworld, in a game that's less and less of an MMO. On top of all that, it just ends up being repetitive and monotonous, anyhow.
When I want a single-player story, I'll play a single-player game. When I play an MMO, I want a massively multiplayer world.
runescape had very few kill x quests. granted alot of them where dull for other reasons, but some where good - dessert treasure is prolly the most fun quests i've played yet.
quest in wow are dullest, but at least you can share them which can make them bearable.
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Someone already touched upon this earlier in the thread with reference to UO- there is absolutely no need for quests when you are playing alongside thousands of other human beings. Given the right tools, options, and instigating factors for player on player interaction; (be it conflict or camaraderie) there is a potentially endless amount of unrepetitive and enjoyable experiences to be had.
Quests are dinosaurs. Single player, 2-D, top-down, relics of the offline era and they are no longer relevant. They're simply easy for designers to cling to as a crutch and wonderful for keeping people who don't know any better paying their monthly sub-fees.
When Microsoft or Sony finally makes a mini-PC-for-idiots "console" that not only has the power but the peripherals to support MMOwhatever- only then will you see an open-ended sandbox game; and it will put the quest driven garbage of this era to shame in sales.
Such a game would do well now if it stood a chance in hell of first being made. People love to point fingers towards the UO exodus when Everquest materialized and OSI's trammel concession... BUT THAT WAS NEARLY A DECADE AGO! HELLO!?
Less than a million people combined played any sort of MMOanything. The ones who were playing came from very particular sectors of PC gamers who were more similar to one another than they'd like to think. (read: Nerds) The MMO biz is now as big any other stupid American fad and people from wide backgrounds are now playing... the resounding majority of which only coming aboard in the past few years. Quest based games are all they've ever known.
The point is there's really no telling whether a modern-day "Ultima Online" type game would beat the living shit out of it's modern-day "Everquest" counterpart.... Given the popularity of conflict-centric reality television shows, competitive sports, and online shooters on consoles- I'd say modern-day UO would kick modern-day EQ's ass.
Such a thought makes the carebears who have been burning through content for the past 10 years, moving from game to game like a parasitic cancer ever since EQ, shudder in horror. Waiting such a long time to see them "get theirs" (I'm one of those nerds from 1998, one of the cool ones
) makes me enthusiastically await their perpetual misery when quest-based games are pulled off life-support... so I'm just a teency bit biased...
Hope you got your things together. Hope you are quite prepared to die. Looks like we're in for nasty weather. ... There's a bad moon on the rise.
I'm sure someone has already mentioned this, in one way or another, but MMO "quests" are shallow and trivial for 2 reasons:
1) They take place in a static world
2) They're scripted
Completing a quest never really effects the game world in any significant way. You just killed 10 wolves so NPC #21 in village #12 can make clothes for everyone. Great. You got some xp, some money, and maybe some gear. Unfortunately, nothing really changed. NPC #21 is still standing in village #12 giving out the exact same quest to every single player that comes through.
Predictability is another issue. When you get a scripted quest you're not walking into a dynamic encounter, you're walking into a script. This happens here, then that happens there, then this guys pops up. If you've gone through the quest once, you never really want to do it again, because you know exactly whats gonna happen. No wonder devs have such a hard time keeping up with "content". It's all single-serving, dispossable content.
guildwars does have good story quests. likely the best main quest line in recent MMO times.
I find it amazing that by 2020 first world countries will be competing to get immigrants.
Excellent post goneglockin.
I agree completely. It's funny reading posts about how 'NPCs should be more human!'. MMOs already have plenty of humans, so why the need for NPCs?
You want to effect the world? Give the players the tools to create the world and 'dynamic quests' WILL come. Eventually someone will want to build a Castle or somesuch and he'll need people to get materials, people to defend his work, hell, people to assist with the work as he couldn't possibly do it on his own. He'll need people to haul the materials in from far away, which means more people to escort the haulers because there's bound to be robbers along the trail. He'll need crafters to create all the stone for the castle. Then what about when someone else decides she wants to knock his castle down? You can see where I'm going here.
Sure you don't get xp or items but you help built a castle and probably an empire! You're not just using some castle that was placed there by game designers, it's YOUR castle. Even if it is just a game, it has some meaning to you. I think that's a hell of a lot more fun than doing quests for NPCs.
there are already a few MMO's that have this.
I find it amazing that by 2020 first world countries will be competing to get immigrants.
I have a question:
First, I need to explain that for me, a quest is synonymous with a "long term goal". Thus, I don't view "kill X", "collect x" or "heal x" as quests.
So here is a typical definition of something I would call a quest. Say they is a faction of criminals lead by a evil dragon (yes, very cliche, but bear with me). Killing the dragon on its own would require a team effort, and would likely drop some nice items. You could do this anytime as long as you could physically get to him and kill him.
However, he would also be part of a long quest to destroy the entire organisation. So early in the quest you would capture a footsoldier, then interrogate a spy, defeat a regiment, capture a general, etc, etc. The final step would still be killing the dragon, but this would complete the quest and provide additional reward than just the dragon loot. This is typically why quests exist: to provide a succession of objectives, and additional reward for completing all of them.
Now, with quests this is very easy. At each stage of the quest, you report back to the city guard, and receive your next set of instructions. Without quests, you have two options as I see it:
1. Have every step reward the player with some sort of drop, which tradeskillers must combine to provide the final reward to the player. Problems? Well yes, how do you inform the players that all these items are part of something bigger?
2. Flag the character every time he kills one of these mobs, and "poof" the reward into his inventory when he completes all required encounters. Problems? Yes, the problems are obvious.
Or you decide not to reward players for completing a series of goals at all. You treat each mob individually, and only reward the player with items that each mob drops on its own. No series of objectives, and no overall reward.
That's my question. My logic is this:
A. Completing all the objectives is more difficult than completing a few of them.
B. Rewards can exist for 100% completion additional to individual encounter rewards.
C. Without quests, you have to rely on tradeskill drops or simple character flags.
D. The methods in C. are less intuitive/ logical than relating tasks to players via quests, and would probably lead to increased reliance on cheat sites. Plus, these are almost like quests anyhow.
E. Scrapping multiple-stage objectives would serve little purpose, except to make the game less cohesive.
Or the fact that the spider with 6 eyes only have one you can loot every 10th kill...
No but seriously. Why should they ask you to collect heads? It's not like they got anything to do with them and they don't really care as long as you've seen to it that the farm is clean of dinosaurs. No matter how you did it's only the fact that you've completed the objective that matters.
You just nailed it.
Fun
But that is why they force to to collect heads. Of course I still haven't figured out why only every 5th guy has a head. They must be zombies!
Or the fact that the spider with 6 eyes only have one you can loot every 10th kill...
No but seriously. Why should they ask you to collect heads? It's not like they got anything to do with them and they don't really care as long as you've seen to it that the farm is clean of dinosaurs. No matter how you did it's only the fact that you've completed the objective that matters.
Well if you want the real answer its because these games are not made to be stateful. They are a completely static imagining of these so-called worlds.And this is also why the quests tend to be generic.
Some people here are lamenting the streamling and quicking of quests. But all the things they thought were cool are also barriers to enjoyment for others. The current state of quests as far as quick and not too arduous, ie. what WoW. Is exactly because that is what most people want out of them.
But the genericness is due to both the need for simplicity and the fact that these game are completely static. There is no state, the farm is never clear. It is always in a state of generating enemies. Basically its hell. The denizens of these lands are forever being tormented and you can never truly help them.
Loaded Elder Scrolls Oblivion up over the weekend, and realized how night and day quests are in that game versus your typical MMO.
Here are just a few ideas:
1. Class-specific quests that require you to use your class's unique talents/abilities. As a warrior, let me take a quest where I need to patrol a merchant's house and fight off a team of intruders from the Thieves Guild. As a thief, let me break into the merchant's house and steal his prized amulet instead.
2. Quests that involve mysteries or puzzles. Some of my favorite Oblivion quests have to do with solving a murder or theft by gathering clues instead of simply beating people over the head.
3. Allow players to make meaningful moral choices. Obilivion does this very well - kill an innocent NPC and you're going to have a bounty on your head. But on the plus side you could be recruited into the Dark Brotherhood. Tabula Rasa also offers "moral" dilemmas, only there's no punishment or reward for being a drug-running, murdering SOB.
Yes, I know not everything can be recreated from a single player RPG to an MMOG environment. But thanks to instancing I think more and more can be done to move away from the "go collect 25 more bat eye" style quests.
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PS. Can you even imagine a MMO with absolutely NO mobs or other NPCs? Thought so
I think many players want a feeling of individuality, that their character and experiences are like no other, in a good way.
Playing a single player game this is easier, there are no other people so anything you do it seems like you are the only one doing it, until you talk to others online, then your adventure seems more common place and you seem like a faceless person in many.
Whenever you put a story or quests in an online game, you are setting the populace up to have the air knocked out of their sails right off the bat, it is blatantly obvious that you are all doing the same thing. Not having quests or a story helps a bit, but you still realize that whatever you have done, so have others and many times.
Really you are confronted with this notion that no matter what you do you are not special, different and important in anyway. Yeah not saying that people are seeking meaning in video games, but it probably doesn't help that the real world is just as empty and meaningless as games are, so no wonder people are always looking to get away then becoming dissapointed when it is too close to home.
Don't you worry little buddy. You're dealing with a man of honor. However, honor requires a higher percentage of profit
I'd like to see quests that for once have a permanent impact on the world.
In an MMO it would require instancing but it would be great to raze the evil wizard's tower and have it stay burnt down for good. If you do a quest to eliminate a band of thieves blocking the road I don't want to see them respawn 5 minutes later. It makes the quest seem pointless.
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Even in wow there where some quests i liked, becouse most where dull quest, these where a very enjoyable quest chain.
First one was that linken sword quest that secret quest in ungaro in that little lake a long chain of quest i love it.
And that very long quest from fallenhero by entrance blasted lands was also a great quest chain.
Ive only play wow in first year of his launch so dunno if later where more quests like these, but even tho i dont like wow this is what i remember i liked in that game these long quests where you needed to do alot travel alot and even had to collect items to craft something, to contuing further.
I like quest where you need to do alot travel alot find out things and where parts are solo or in party, have to craft or all kinds of things that make such a quest enjoyable and fun:).
You had many of those in morrowind or oblivion even more complex and much more rpg style but you get picture:).
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