Guide: How to make a mmo FOR Game Developers!

 

I started playing MMO’s back in 1996, didn’t start heavily investing my time into them until 2003 (making it my primary source of entertainment). I’m by no means claiming I’m some game guru Veteran, but just as a mmo enthusiast. My opinion’s and experiences with each game I play differ for others. I am not speaking for the community at large, I speak for myself, and some of this may hold some worth to pay attention too. I stress pay attention because every last one of you missed all the red flags so it’s time someone spells them out for you. It’s time to get this off my chest.

   

I’ve sat back and watched MMO developers fail. I don’t know the first thing about programming but the coding isn’t the only problems with the games released. It’s the horrible design ideas. Anyone can see the provided track record of MMOS that flopped. A perfect template on what not to do. But yet all developers do it anyway. So I went ahead a made this guide just for you MMO Game Developer.

 

I’ll use many old and current MMO’s as references, some of them you may get, others not. I’ll try to categorize some things that stand out, let’s begin.

  

Graphics

On one hand you have those looking for the latest and greatest thing. Others want something that will run well on their system which may not be in range of “current”. To justify the cheap people that don’t want to upgrade it’s not always in the budget, it’s sometimes hard to justify a expensive purchase just for a single video game.

 

So what’s the answer?

I think EQ2 had a pretty good idea. They released the game with the ability to scale the graphics up so high that even high end systems even in later years couldn’t take advantage of all it had to offer yet. The idea was to ensure a pleasing experience for everyone.

 

So what went wrong with that idea? The bare minimal at the time was higher then most current systems could handle. Not only that, Core 2, and SLI graphic configuration wasn’t supported. That and at the release of the game it was unstable contained memory leaks and ram like a dog on most systems. It painted a bad image from the get go.

 

My question is why would you have this wonderful idea but set the system specs so high? For that matter release something unfinished.

 

SOE consistently pushes out games before they are ready. As a result we take a look at both EQ2 and Vanguard, our latest examples. Both games had to under gone large server downsizes because a majority of the players left. More reasons why these players left will unfold as I continue. Personally I’m all about the best of the best graphics. I’m a fan of eye candy but nice graphics or not stability holds more wealth.  

 

So MMO designer here’s step one.

Provide a scaling graphic system; let everyone have the option to purchase your game. Now you have a wider market.   

 

Next thing were going to talk about is support.

I’ve played many MMO’s, had great experiences and have had horrible experiences all which are company specific. Doesn’t take long to figure out who to avoid.

 

When someone gets stuck can’t move in the game that’s pretty much seals the deal of a bad day. Not providing anyway out without game master intervention can be avoidable. Provided you give adequate easy to use tools for us to use.  If you’re going to under staff the support then you better have the resources available.  Too many MMO companies do this!

 

Blizzard Entertainment I will say I’m pretty impressed with. Any issue I asked for help on or be address I get an answer within 30mins. That’s reasonable. Most of all they have the power to address your issue.

 

Let’s look at Sony On-line Entertainment. It’s always taken days for me to get a response and if I do, they are never helpful or even do anything for me. It’s like there purpose is to be a personalized answering machine that actually doesn’t forward your message. More like a bully placed there to repeat “Too bad so sad”.   

 

Not only that at the end of the conversation all GMs asked me to visit the forums. The same forum where you find 30 page threads of other people with the same problem unanswered. To fix this the company deletes the thread so there is no problem.  So let me break it down for ya. This pisses people off. When people get pissed off about incompetence they are not going to continue to pay. You lose money, this is bad mkay?

 

Sqauresoft and NCSOFT Also have bad support. Although not as bad but around the same response time, but at least have a bit more power to address your issue. The wait time however is totally unacceptable if you want to be serous about making more money in the long run.

 

Sound

No one really gives much thought to sound, least I never see much effort put in. Just think about watching a movie. When you sitting in front of the big screen with a nice surround sound it really makes a difference. So why can’t we expect this out of a MMO?

 

Also all soundtracks from most MMO’s sound the same. Anyone could pick it out or confuse it with some old RPG game. Think outside the box people! Let’s modernize. Everyone listens to their own music today playing these games. Because we cannot immerse or self’s in this crap.

 

I award EVE on-line with possibly not only the worst MMO music but the worst music in general. I could put a cat in front of a synthesizer and have it paw the thing and make a mock up of this crap. Honestly WTF.

 

I do grant major Kudos to one MMO game however. That would have to be Lineage II although the sounds effects really need polishing the music had amazing quality, and fit well. They used basically classical music with feel to it. When you would enter a dungeon and Bill Browns music hit your headphones it was empowering! You new trouble was on the way, it was like making your own movie. It invoked feel!

 

Not a single MMO has come close to matching the quality of music selection to capture the moment.  Come on guys you can do much better then this. Takes money to make it.

 

Let’s talk about PVP

 

There are a couple MMO’s out there that have it. What’s now clear is there’s a larger demand then ever before. This is where I find the biggest disappointment. The point of player vs. player is to challenge another person with your wit, a duke to the death. The excitement and thrill of that could never be matched in PVE. The latest MMOS have implemented systems to work against these rewarding principles.

 

A look at EQ2 attempt at PVP. 90% of all players can run mid combat when they know they have been defeated. Does the attacker get rewarded? Nope the winner must chase down the looser, most of the time this is impossible.

 

No one logs on to chase a coward for 20mins, it’s long and boring. Especially if you wave rewards in players facing such as PVP rewards and you the players has to go through all that per kill just to get credit. Chasing people isn’t fun.

 

One of the things a lot of games get wrong is level capping on spells and abilities in PVP.

To simplify lets say you’re a caster type class. You come across someone two levels above you, same class as yours. The advantage goes to the person that has 2 more levels then you. This means he/she should have a little more Hit Points and Mana, maybe a spell or two more. Simple logic I know. But instead some games add high resist rates. Now that person your fighting that is only 2 levels above you is granted a guaranteed win. Why? Because over 50% of your spells resisted having zero effect. Exactly where is the fun in that? Hell even if I’m the higher level I know I won because of the resist rate. I had nothing to gain out of that fight it was predetermined before I even attacked. SOE decided to copy cat this failed logic in Vanguard making the game meet the same demise of downsizing and crappy PVP. 

 

This is not to be confused with ganking. Ganking is ganking. That’s just unwritten law with any PVP game. I’m fine with having no chance against someone 15 levels above me. That’s just the nature of the beast. But even up to six levels there should not be that kind of advantage because of resists. How much do you guys get paid to think this up? Need an outside consultant? Drop me an e-mail, Jesus.

 

PVP Balancing.

 

I have much respect for those that study and work on this. I understand this is a great feat. The only way to learn is studying the players. This is time consuming.  Needless to say difficult. 

 

Great deal of us enjoy a one vs. one. Hell that’s what I live for. Many games after a while give up the PVP balance race and state the following “PVP is not balanced around one on one”. Problem solved for the company. Now the players are left to decide if they want to group or find a new game. But right now there is no game to go too. Yet…

 

Blizzard Entertainment for the first year I felt did a decent job. However there were classes too weak and strong. The duration it took them to rebalance the class far exceeded a reasonable time frame. End result most of the classes reworked became too strong.. Hell even at last year’s 2007 Blizzcon people stood up in the middle of the PVP presentation and yelled nerf a certain class in the game and the entire crowd supported them. This is important to the customer don’t be cheap. It has a large impact.

 

 

PVP Gear

The main source of income comes from the casual player. That being the Majority with hardcore in mind you have to keep the balance. There are plenty of great skilled casuals that play these games. Casuals should not be punished because they are unable to stay up to 3am to grind for gear just to compete and continue to have an even playing field.  No one logs on to get owned, if someone is unable to do this grind the desire of getting own by players they normally could beat is very unrewarding. But the same token if the grind for gear takes a long time, during that whole time the casual is still faced with the underpowered feel and often leaves in frustration or lack of fairness.  It’s quite taxing to once be good at something and have it removed right out from under you because you added more gear.

 

PVP should not be about gear, it should be about skill. There should be room to improve your character and I can’t stress this work enough, improve SLIGHTLY continuing to keep a good balance and happy medium. There are plenty of options to beef up the grind to include cool graphics or effects, or strictly limit it to PVE applications.

 

Let’s do a recap here. PVP should be live or die period. Remove resists in PVP. Don’t even think about giving the blanket statement “It’s not based on one vs. one”.  Don’t be cheap. Don’t ignore the customer. Don’t under power players via gear.

 

 

 

 

 

Restricting content for group play only.

 

I’ve worked 2^nd shift for the last eight years. I always have to spend all this time patching my computer for some game. Or here about all this exciting hype is about said new group dungeon or instance. That’s great in all but everyone would like to see it. Grouping is not always in option, the sheer numbers required to do such places is ridiculous. Everyone should be able to enjoy the new content and have access or means to obtain the same rewards as everyone. If you haven’t forgotten I must remind you, the casual’s is where the majority of the money flows from. You might have some insightful or strong feelings about limiting content to just large raids, but guess what? The majority doesn’t get access; feel they’ve been ripped off time and time again when they read patch notes.  Do not limit content to select groups of players, allow everyone’s means to access those resources in solo or even duo play.

  

 

Longevity of the game.

 

How can you entice people to stay besides actually following these directions? Well that depends on content. I’ll start off by telling you what not to do. For this I bring up EVE on-line.

 

EVE although a pretty well thought up game painted it’s self in to a corner when it comes to new players trying to enjoy a balanced experience in both PVE and PVP. Players that like to work hard, their efforts are void. That experience is taking away by a system in place that advances everyone at a very slow pace. This is a outer space game. You drive different ships. Say you wanted to start mining for cash. You just can’t work say 20 hours on it and have the necessary skills and knowledge to do it. In this game you select the skills you need which starts a count down. You must learn many skills before you can start mining in a barge. The better you want to be in that field the more time you have to invest So you log off and wait weeks later to log back on and finally get to use it. This started to get out of hand for me. When I reached the skills that required 45days some longer like 3 months. Between that and the lack of solo PVP content (blobs on-line!) It wasn’t enough to entertain me to stay.

 

Wow’s idea of longevity is to raise the level cap. Which I see a large number of people that don’t agree with this system. I think what spices up a game and makes it most interesting is the adding of classes for a game this old. A single one class isn’t enough. Needs more flavor! Even for those that don’t desire it they will have new challenges to look forward too vs. the new classes. This by no means guarantees anything but it’s a real start.  Not many stick around after so many years. I mean I played it for three years. Between the Gear and the grind of mind numbing pain over and over after this amount of time I felt it was time to find something new and refreshing. Since then I’ve been faced with games that made me laugh out loud on what exactly your staff was paid to do all this time. What a complete waste of resources and money.  

 

Moving on!

 

Live events, not many games provide it. Get GMs involved, little custom live events go a long way. On the fly even just random. It really personalizes the game and provides a good image to boot. A Image that you do in fact care about the customer. I don’t know of any current game that does this, guess for the simple reason for saving a buck. Takes money to make it. You’ve already wasted ass loads of money with making a game pure of fail so perhaps you won’t listen to me on this suggestion. But it you haven’t figured it out (I’m being modest) that’s not enough you have to do better.

 

Communication

 

Very important. When you visit a website about a problem, you get there to find long threads on the forums about your problem unanswered and ignored for some time. Because you don’t know I’ll tell ya, this pisses people off.   

 

In all MMO’s I’ve seen petitions made about a problem that a majority of the players agree on. Rather then address the issue at hand the threads are deleted. Some even punished for starting a petition. Petitions wouldn’t have to be created if time is spent to support the community. No matter how small the priority of the issue.

 

When concerns are acknowledged no time line is presented.  A perfect example, a server goes down. Should I the player do something else or should I continue to sit here and try my luck, perhaps it will be on-line and second now. It would be damn nice if someone would just have the balls to be honest. “Hey the servers will be down at least 5 hours, we honestly don’t know WTF is going on”. Fair enough, in fact great I can plan my day to do something else.

 

More about concerns, the blanket statement line any MMO company will give “It will be addressed soon”. Soon means years. The people that took the time create a post and draw up a description for you with tons of replies from your paying players asking you to look in to a problem, means help. The reward? Ignored. Perhaps a big ass sign in your face that says HEY this is important might draw some attention. Time for new policies. This one blows.   

 

But hey how about being proactive with the communication. No one likes undocumented changes about the game they didn’t approve or hear about. Happens way to much and it pissed people off. I could make a long list of undocumented changes I experienced that impacted me in a negative way. You made it but this isn’t your game, it’s your customer’s game. Ask first, find a happy medium then implement. Not before.

 

When making discussions get the public involved. Don’t just present your best idea and think it’s the best way. Fact is you don’t know what the hell your customers want because you don’t ask. Only they know what they want and give them some choices and they will show you!

 

Speed, just how fast should the game be? What should it look like?

 

This is a very hard thing to address. So many people have different tastes it’s hard to figure out the appropriate speed. Looking at all the MMOS out there I’d take a look at the current biggest successors and copy cat it. It is after all what the majority are playing, suits them enough right? No not right instead you get games like Dungeons and Dragons, and also Vanguard. The combat is a bit slow. Grinding out killing monsters is already tedious add the time duration of a couple minutes just to kill a single creature is a snore fest. If you want to try something new like that go ahead. But just know if it’s slow and boring like D&D at least know many will quit by level 2, as that MMO Company found out already.

 

I’m not saying don’t have long lasting fights in situations. I think in PVP it’s a bit more fun to get in to the moment rather then just 2 shot someone. But if the combat looks like something out of a slow motion affect out of a movie then cram it up your ass.

 

Don’t have a limited amount of combat animations. Give us a truck load. It is in fact what we look at every time we play. It is after all our virtual self if you will. Do you think its entertaining to watch the same motion over and over and over? D&D did. Look at that profit margin. How they afford to stay running I still have to research.

 

What are some good things already out there that players enjoy?

There’s a ton of stuff out there and ideas to utilize. I’ll list a few.

 

In EQ2 rather then walking up to a quest giver like every other mmo out there, this game the quest giver has its own unique voice and tells you the quest.  That’s just damn amazing! Brilliant work. No other MMO has copied this idea. A real shame. But just breathe taking the amount of money time and thought put in to this.

 

Lineage II – The music. Music changes with the surrounding area and what is currently taking place to best match the mood or condition of the experience you’re having at the present. Enter a dark creepy area; music fades out in to something less cheerful. Enter a dungeon something a bit more heroic, out in the beautiful wild the music turns to something more light and relaxing.  Simple idea but great. The feel to the music of your game is great. Unmatched by none.

 

EVE – A pioneer on a totally different type of MMO. Didn’t go with the classic slash and bash style MMO like 99% of the rest of them. The amount of support and effort put forth to continue to improve the visuals of the game even this far down the road shows commitment. I like the vast large world layout and how players get to control and defend there own space. The market economy all player driven. I can’t even comprehend how you created this game. The things you’ve done outside the standard mmo is just damn brilliant.

 

WOW – Best overall PVP experience a MMO has to offer right now. Plenty of ways to get it. The stability and support f the game since release has shown an unmatched commitment of support compared to any game on the market.  The best uptime to downtime ratio I’ve ever experienced.

 

 

Content, specifically NPC’s

 

Let’s face it the monsters make the game. What’s really enticing about a new upcoming MMO is that you don’t have to fight the same damn things you have for the last year or two. 

 

My first MMO was FFXI. I played this for a year. At level 5 I was on my way to fighting crabs, level 15 crabs again, 25 crabs again, 35, 45, and 55 you guessed it crabs! All of them identical only thing different was the name.  How the MMO world has grown up so fast. If a game came out today like this today it would go under in just a couple months.

 

That said lets keep the content exciting. Keep implementing different monsters, never stop! Change appearances for the seasons if the games have them (long hair, short hair etc). Most importantly don’t place the same darn thing in another zone. Even the ever popular wow does this. Pre BC Expansion there are not many zones you can’t find a cat, or spider. After BC, Bugs! Be creative.  How about a giant hootered monster? Actually that might be a bad idea. Just be creative!

 

Little off topic but Spells and ability appearances are very essential. If you crack off this tiny peanut fire ball towards someone, that’s not entertaining at all. Now if lighting is flying from your figure tips, static fills the area and the land scape starts to glow with what’s now headed towards your enemy. That there is just cool!

 

 The desired experiences of the MMO player.

 

When you sit down to a good movie and get in to it. The kind of movie where you smile, feel embarrassed for one of the people in it, jump out of your seat because something scared you. Well it’s no different. 

 

I’ll never forget when I fired up doom 3 the game for the first time. This monster jumped out from underneath the steps and it was the first time I actually jumped in my seat because of a video game. That there is just funny and great at the same time!

 

PVP often times catch you by surprise and make you jump. That’s one of the things so great about it.  You have to remember in this game you are the character in essences it is the actor. You plaster a unrealistic (large hooters are ok! J) on it or make it look plan and boring, Then well it’s not fun to watch is it? 

 

If anything is boring to watch you can’t get in to it. Players that don’t get in to it fail to renew there subscriptions.

 

Last but not least, let’s hire that guy that made that other game fail!

But it makes you wonder. Every MMO you see they get some body who they believe to be a hotshot designer from another MMO. A MMO which failed. This person then takes what the know (which is shit) and duplicates it all over again.

 

These are new times, things change. Its time to get new people involved that are hardcore gamers. Get those kind of people in there to make discussions. If I wanted an old school poor MMO game I’d just head to store and pick up one of many already out there made by a lot of the same people that now work at your company. That well, honestly lost any insight to gaming since Metamucil became a daily part of their diet.