Ironically, attempting to make a game realistic will only make the unrealistic parts stand out - like the health bar. These will kill immersion anyway unless you sit motionlessly on a pier (so you don't notice the clipping) and fish.
In a movie like Star Wars, 300 , Alice in Wonderland people became immersed in an unrealistic environment.
Also movies like The Patriot/ Braveheart/ or King Arthur which had a realistic enivornment it was possible to be immersed.
The trick to immersion whether the gameplay is realistic or not is to make it fun. Fishing in wow is boring as hell to me but playing the fishing games with the controller rod on PS 2 was absolutely fun.
The problem is people don't talk in old english and if you make them your immersion is going to be ruined in another respect, lack of population as people will leave and play WoW where they can say whatever they want....
The #1 thing that ruins immersion for me is the chat system. All modern MMOs have whispers and global / area-wide chat channels where everyone can communicate telepathically and every school kid can use it as their playground. UO didn't have this originally - restricted communication is something I really appreciate now that it's gone.
It also used to make cities more meaningful as people would naturally gather there in order to socialize, meet-up, and do business. It's all "new and improved" but imo it's most certainly not better. Nowadays you can be alone, deep within a forest in the middle of the night. You kneel down to examine the deer's mutilated corpse. It's fresh and the beast that killed it must be close. Suddenly you hear a twig snap loudly behind you and you spin around to confront the.... Bumnugget whispers: "U HEEL?"
You reply: "Sorry busy atm"
Bumnugget whispers: "K" .. werewolf. The first thing you notice are it's piercing yellow eyes which almost seem to glow in the darkness. Suddenly it crouches down to pounce and snarls loudly. You fumble... [General Chat] Imtwelve: "anal [Ravage]"
[General Chat] ChickNurras: "anal [Backstab]"
[General Chat] Lolwut: "STFU" ... for your silver dagger. The werewolf leaps towards you. It's roar thundering through you, causing near-heart stopping panic, with it's sharp claws outstretched, glimmering in the moonlight. Joe whispers: "Hey man. Work sucked today "
You: ":(" Your hand closes over your dagger's hilt and you draw it and thrust outward in blind fear as the monster crashes in to you, it's huge body pinning you to the ground. You're aware your left shoulder is injured but it's still numb and you stab frantically with your right arm, burying the dagger in to it's ribs over and over. Joe whispers: "Yeah. My boss is really getting on my nerves. He gave me a written warning for being late again."
Depending on my mood I vary in this from being exactly the same as your post all the the way to liking barrens chat. I don't think it would be that hard to have simple checkbox options for some of this:
1. No whispers unless grouped - maybe with a list of exceptions. A lot of people would tick this because of the gold sellers.
2. No region chat except in cities or dungeons. I'd tick something like this depending on mood.
I'd normally want to be able to make a couple of exceptions for a help channel and a LFG channel so you could uncheck region chat but keep those - assuming those channels were well policed.
Thinking about it, it does seem to come down mostly to the chat channel filtering being specific enough for what people want. I like the idea of a "no whispers unless grouped" option with an exception list. I don't think I've seen that in any game so far.
I've thought about this a lot and I don't believe that's a workable solution. Besides any ignore list limit (10 in WoW I think?), if you filter the chat yourself then that's just you doing it. It still doesn't encourage other people to go to cities and taverns to meet up and do business, and largely just gives you a reputation for being ignorant. You'll also never get a group unless you participate in these global telepathic communities.
I know I'll be in a minority about this but it's my personal bug-bear.
Not ignore, but filter. Two different things. Example: Filter off general chat when playing unless you need to ask something.
I had a great time reading and laughing all the way through it. I can not tell you how many times I have felt the same way about crafting and questing. You see I don't play MMOs all the time, some times I like to make things in my shop out of wood. And although it is posable to cut yourself or hit your finger with an hammer, for the most part I stopped doing that along time ago. I've been making things out of wood for alittle over 25 years, so when I set down and start to make a chair, it ends up being just what I wanted it to be. I do not loss the wood (PUFF its gone),I do not come up with TWO chairs, And you can take it to the bank that I will make more money selling my chair than the cost of the wood it took to make.
Again thanks
..its a guideline, not a rule, as players we must remember: Its a Game.
I've thought about this a lot and I don't believe that's a workable solution. Besides any ignore list limit (10 in WoW I think?), if you filter the chat yourself then that's just you doing it. It still doesn't encourage other people to go to cities and taverns to meet up and do business, and largely just gives you a reputation for being ignorant. You'll also never get a group unless you participate in these global telepathic communities.
I know I'll be in a minority about this but it's my personal bug-bear.
Not ignore, but filter. Two different things. Example: Filter off general chat when playing unless you need to ask something.
Yes, I realize that but the effect is the same. It would just be me personally choosing to not the see the messages and wouldn't encourage people to hang around in social locations nor make me seem any less ignorant!
To enjoy "immersion" in a game it really helps to have absolutely zero formal education in history, geology, botany, chemistry, or meteorology or have any experience with "oldy-time" trades such as blacksmithing or be involved in any SCA chapter.
To have any of the above only ensures that you will be yanking your hair out at the apparent ignorance or outright idiocy of world and game system designers.
Drev
"If MMORPG players were around when God said, "Let their be light" they'd have called the light gay, and plunged the universe back into darkness by squatting their nutsacks over it." -Luke McKinney, The 7 Biggest Dick Moves in the History of Online Gaming
"In the end, SWG may have been more potential and promise than fulfilled expectation. But I'd rather work on something with great potential than on fulfilling a promise of mediocrity." -Raph Koster
Immersion can mean different things but in MMO shorthand we tend to think of realism or simulation that transports us from the comfort of our homes to this alternate universe. The fact is there are very few MMOs that have even tried. To me crafting and fishing mechanics seem like symptoms of the problem more than the root issue.
I think, for me, immersive game design means the designers really understand how things do work in the real world and have as a goal creating a space where players truly feel a part of that world. However, they have to do this in a way that makes the experience enjoyable and rewarding. How's that for a vague and unhelpful couple of words? Different people find different experiences enjoyable and different kinds of kudos or bits of bling rewarding.
So let's focus on gamers who presumably want both realistic immersion (or at least plausible immersion) in a setting. How would a designer interested in immersion go about crafting or fishing?
Well, no need to reinvent the wheel. But it might be smart to look at other games beyond the genre to see how they handle things and maybe learn from why they're successful. There are fishing games out there. They may have more depth and complexity than a minigame in an MMO needs but you can pare the concept, which repeats across all titles, down to basic elements of chosing lures, casting and allowing the player "twitch" based control of the rod. That's right. Make it an action game. Keep most functional rewards limited to that minigame. The successes you have may allow access to trophies that can be decoratively displayed, meat that can be sold or used as a crafting ingredient, and perhaps have other rewards like better gear, more lures, and so forth, but it should primarily feed back into itself. No magic items. Just fish. But make those fish interesting. Make catching them challenging.
In other words, make it a game that would be worth playing on its own merits and based on somewhat realistic, if simplified, principles.
Crafting's a bit harder. You almost need that repetitious and boring element in there to weed out those who aren't as interested in being a master crafter as those who are else everyone and his brother will be a master crafter or have one as an alt - and this can create an overabundance of high end goods on the market. Goods created have to have a real function in the game and, in a perfect crafting game, must be superior to anything that can be scrounged as dropped loot. Complexity is what made crafting so interesting to those who loved it in old school SWG and to this day most player-crafters constantly cite it as the best crafting game ever. In SWG you could really dig into resource stats, develop your own high end tools (or buy them) to make the best product, create networks of suppliers for resources and subcomponents. Much of the grindwork, once you got past a certain point, could be managed by using item blueprints in factories or setting mining rigs up to draw in resources from an ever changing pool of geographically positioned raw materials. And those materials themselves had a host of traits which made keeping track of them and stockpiling reserves against shortages a very key thing.
If someone got good at this they'd become famous. In all cases the crafter's name was stuck on the items he made and usually established "brands" of very high end goods would be custom named in order to further set them apart on the market.
How many other games would let a crafter become that famous or sought after? Very few if any. In all other games crafting is a cookiecutter activity that produces generic rewards.
That doesn't help alleviate the grinding issue and certainly factors like encumbrance can be a pain. But instead of eliminating it I'd include wagons in the universe. Load it up and haul your stuff around as needed. One of SWG's big failings was a lack of rhyme or reason in the space portion of the game. People could just teleport from world to world and carry as much stuff as they wanted, almost, while doing it. So when space ships finally showed up nobody needed them to haul goods or passengers. Imagine Han Solo trying to make a living in that universe. Conversely we see in Eve Online that a huge amount of the gameplay comes from, not just PvP, but from the adventures that arise naturally from logistics and transport across long (and time consuming) distances. It's not always exciting in High Sec, though many long haulers have fun chatting/roleplaying with friends as they fly, but in Low Sec or 0.0 things get far more interesting and risky.
Here's an old article on Immersion, literally called "On Immersion", from my blog. It's a roleplayer's perspective on the topic but many of my blog entries touch on the subject because it's just that important.
"Immersion is a loaded word with different meanings for different folks but it's one I'll sit down and discuss with you.
What? I can't sit? That's not a good sign. A sitting avatar often means, in roleplayese, "Sit down and talk to me." Nonroleplayers tend to be rushing around everywhere, places to go and things to kill, but roleplayers love a cozy setting where they can plop their bums down and just do their thing. Not being able to sit immediately reminds a player his avatar is just a character in a game and, when that happens, poof goes immersion. It's the canary in the coal mine - either a developer gets this off the bat or he probably is missing alot of other stuff roleplayers look for.
Immersive elements include setting, control, dynamism and simulation...."
Developers playtest EVE, we all know how that ended (cough, cheating, cough, exploiting, cough). Besides if management tells them to do things they will do it and make that little script that fills the gap. But have no fear, games like that die and you get to try a new one, free market is working in world of mmos. If you don't like WOW you just don't play it, simple as that. If a game starts annoying you instead of making you glad you played it it's time to move on.
Besides we all know that 99% of developers never ever tests their code out. Ever! Any industry in the world. This is why QA teams are huge for all who want to make a quality product.
No fate but what we make, so make me a ham sandwich please.
Here's an old article on Immersion, literally called "On Immersion", from my blog. It's a roleplayer's perspective on the topic but many of my blog entries touch on the subject because it's just that important. http://www.mmorpg.com/blogs/OddjobXL/022009/3374_On-Immersion "Immersion is a loaded word with different meanings for different folks but it's one I'll sit down and discuss with you. What? I can't sit? That's not a good sign. A sitting avatar often means, in roleplayese, "Sit down and talk to me." Nonroleplayers tend to be rushing around everywhere, places to go and things to kill, but roleplayers love a cozy setting where they can plop their bums down and just do their thing. Not being able to sit immediately reminds a player his avatar is just a character in a game and, when that happens, poof goes immersion. It's the canary in the coal mine - either a developer gets this off the bat or he probably is missing alot of other stuff roleplayers look for. Immersive elements include setting, control, dynamism and simulation...." And it goes on from there.
From what was discussed in that article, immersion sound pretty expensive.
I think my post was more intended to explore the subject than offer practical solutions. A new pair of eyes for how to view MMO design when thinking about immersion. If it worked on that level I might have succeeded. If not, no harm in trying.
I find your point about faliure and level of expertise in crafting is very true, but so is the risk element your friend states crafters need. To a point, you're both right.
If you haven't played UO in a while, do so, if for no other reason than crafting. It's the perfect blend, in my opinion, of what crafting in a game SHOULD be.
1) Lots of harvesting for gains. This may sound dull, but it's done in such a way that you get a decent quantity very quickly. How realistic is it that you can advance your skill, as a crafter, with 2 pieces of metal?
2) You do fail and lose materials. A lot. This makes sense because, hey, you're LEARNING the trade. You're going to make mistakes. Ever have to make a set of toaster tongs in shop class in high-school? If you mess up, that piece of wood you messed up with isn't going to be used for anything else, save tooth picks.
3) When you master a carft, the lower level stuff is almost gaurnteed to not fail. As you said, it makes sense, that higher level stuff even a master can struggle with, but entry-level items and equipment are easily done.
4) There's a LOT more control and diversity in crafting coming with the new UO expansion, Stygian Abyss. Imbuing is just one aspect.
5) Variety. Carpentry, Tinkering, Blacksmithing, Tailoring, Alchemy, Fletching, Cooking, soon Imbuing. So many different crafts, for so many different purposes, from the standard equipment and potions, to stuff that's just pure marzipan for housing.
It's for these reasons that I think UO has the best elements of both realism and practicality in a game's crafting system that you simply can't find anywhere else. Crafting is the chief reason I still play UO to this day. I love it. I love the slowness, the steady pace of it. It's cathartic. It's something you do because you love to do it, not because you need to. And the fact that I feel the community is so much better than other games I've played (At least he community I'm in, in terms of guild, server, etc.), and RP is more prevelant in that community (Again, the one I play in) doesn't hurt either.
To enjoy "immersion" in a game it really helps to have absolutely zero formal education in history, geology, botany, chemistry, or meteorology or have any experience with "oldy-time" trades such as blacksmithing or be involved in any SCA chapter. To have any of the above only ensures that you will be yanking your hair out at the apparent ignorance or outright idiocy of world and game system designers.
Drev
I think that's why games shouldn't aim at realism but only at an impression of realism e.g woodwork crafting needing a plane or a saw tool as a re-usable component but never explicitly being used. It should be very impressionistic and aimed at creating the *feeling* of realism not the actuality.
Originally posted by OddjobXL That doesn't help alleviate the grinding issue and certainly factors like encumbrance can be a pain. But instead of eliminating it I'd include wagons in the universe.
Yes, make managing the weight issue part of the process - pack animal, cart, wagon. hired porters etc.
Oh, I don't know, I can see experienced crafters having critical failures. Take Stargate Worlds for example. Look at how many years of combined experience all that talent had, and yet, they went to craft a journeyman game and came up with a critical failure. All the time that was spend accumulating all those items with portraits of various dead Presidents on them gone to waste. Vanguard is another example, as is Tabula Rasa. . I mean, like who'd have ever thunk it that Brad McQuade and Richard Garriott could have had a critical failure in crafting? But they did......... Isn't that why designers build it into their game, just to remind themselves.......?.
Vanguard's harvesting and crafting system is excellent. Tabula Rasa never got to have a crafting system because they pushed the game out before it was ready.
Both of them are not failures of game design, but both were victims of being pushed out half finished. In the case of vanguard, microsoft had a change of priorities to the Xbox and cut off funding. In tabulsa Rasa, although the game had been in development for so long, the game had actually be redesigned a couple times and the version we got had the core of an awesome game it just needed another year in development to actually realize it's potential.
The number one immersion killer these days is *drum roll*
Instancing
How can you possibly explain having the exact same looking area duplicated in the same world? You can't and it is the devs lazy way of handling more load. Just create X number of identical clone zones! yaaay
Some games are ok when it comes to instancing but when it comes to games like AoC, which holds only about 50 people before popping another instanced, I doubt I can still call them MMORPGs.
beta testing, play testing. i don't think half the mmo producers know what beta testing is.
You know, where you just reset the server every so often and wipe everything, or set up users in a random level for a while, let them run about as that level, then wipe the characters stats at the end of the week as if they never existed. Because it's not as if these accounts are real things and the people using them think they are playing the real game.
Or put in beta-only devices into the world that allow players to change their level or class or stats with a click. To fiddle and see if there's less nerfing after a particular level, or if something is fair in one class or another. And then wipe the results clean as if they never existed at the end of the week. It's not like you'll be pissing off players since it's a BETA test and they won't be paying for it. An idea for the developer to gain feedback would be to have a "rate this quest" star system in the beta on each quest, or a "exciting/annoying" button you could press on a script/npc to tally stats on what you think of it during that phase of the testing.
You the developer get feedback and see how people play and statistics and everything you need.
Because nobody who participates in a beta of a game would actually be silly enough to believe they were "playing" the "real thing" would they?
Forum signatures are stupid and annoying. I've turned mine off.
The number one immersion killer these days is *drum roll* Instancing How can you possibly explain having the exact same looking area duplicated in the same world? You can't and it is the devs lazy way of handling more load. Just create X number of identical clone zones! yaaay Some games are ok when it comes to instancing but when it comes to games like AoC, which holds only about 50 people before popping another instanced, I doubt I can still call them MMORPGs.
Well, if each dungeon is only used once or if the dungeons are randomly generated then there are even worse problems than instancing to worry about. It is not out of laziness, but out of practicality and production cost.
Randomly generated dungeons might sound like a good idea, but in reality it can only be used to a certain extent. All randomly generated dungeons are based on a set of parameters, and these parameters cannot be too complex other wise the dungeon will just be one big zone full of bugs and errors. However if it is simple, then then players might not be entertained after a few times through.
If the developer keep designing a new dungeon every week, then the cost of maintaining a game becomes sky high. Maybe if they charge each player $100 dollar a month this could be easily remedied, but I doubt anyone will pay that price to simply have new dungeons to go through every few days.
If a developer can find a cost effective solution to instancing I am sure they would jump at it, but for now they will stick with instancing more often than not.
I don't think randomized systems need to be buggy or boring. We see randomized gameplay in singleplayer games that keeps them alive for decades - one can point to Daggerfall as an example of bad randomization or to X-Com or Civilization or even The Sims as Exhibit A for how to do it right. Isn't the goal of an MMO to maintain longevity and to retain customers over a long haul? Isn't the biggest complaint often the lack of "end game" content? The popularity of PvP with MMO designers is in no small part due to the fact that it's got relatively low overhead from their point of view and keeps players, who like that sort of thing, entertained. However we know this to be a fairly modest subset of the market and even PvPers want PvE content that isn't boring and mindless. In fact, most PvPers will defend PvP gameplay by pointing out just how repetitious and unrewarding, in terms of fun or challenge, PvE gameplay often is in MMOs.
Yes, good randomized or dynamic systems will require a heavy front-end investment because getting them wrong would be worse than not having them at all. Get them right, on the other hand, could for once give us gameplay in an MMO that resembles actual game-like gameplay! Even more important that variability does breed immersion. If you can't just sleepwalk through a generic situation because you've done it 500 times before and have memorized the gamefaq then suddenly what's actually happening before your eyes matters enough to get you to disable the macros and put guildchat on hold while you pay attention to what's going on. That's immersion, baby.
Good to see Sanya is back to that terrible whiny writing style she started with, the type that is irritating to even read.
So to sum this up, Sanya wants a game that is easy mode and always rewards her but never punishes her. If she makes a mistake she wants the game to say hey don't worry about it, no such things as mistakes so here your stuff back try again.
The game she is asking for would be the worst game ever, no penalty to crafting so then every item is worthless because there's no risk in making them, everyone can and no one loses any materials on failing. Terrible that a person who works for a site called MMORPG wants such a non MMORPG.
And to complain about some ambient noises? Really? Who cares, and for that matter if you are waiting for the creature that only spawns at night to come back, uh well come back at night don't just stand there when it just turned day for it to turn night again.
This literally is one of the worst columns I have ever read.
I have to laugh when I think how many of these "problems" can be answered with one word: EVE. While certainly not without its problems, it does address all of these quite well:
Instancing - deadspace complexes are handled separately but still exist in "real space". They require special probes for other players to find (and ninja salvage if they want to), but they can be found. And their whole existance is explained nicely as some sort of subspace phenomena. Aside from this, EVE doesn't make use of much "instancing" and is the only MMO (afaik) where every single player is in the same realm.
Manufacturing - is always successful as long as you a) have the prerequisite skills (which sometimes take YEARS to acquire -literally) and b) materials (which can also be a challenge sometimes, as some things REQUIRE items you can only get as drops - kind of chiken-eggish, no?). Too bad its as boring as heck and the outcome is always the same (plop, ship, plop, another ship...). Why can't my corp make a spiffy looking Rifter than the next corp, or spend more time to make a better one, or shave off some time to make a cheaper one.
Missions - there's no standing around waiting for a mission - you can either do it now, or not do it at all. The only queues I've noticed in EVE is when a jump gate gets backlogged. Missions are fun (at first) and drop you into the combat (or situation) almost instantly. That being said, they get a little repetitve after a while (especially if you're career focussed) and have zero impact on the realm as-is (sad).
EVE has its share of problems (griefing, steep learning curve, blob-warefare, rapant piracy, mining/manufacturing-grinding, shallow character creation, lack of player customization, scamming, etc), but in these areas I have to give it credit for not falling into the MMO rut everyother game seems to be in right now.
Comments
Ironically, attempting to make a game realistic will only make the unrealistic parts stand out - like the health bar. These will kill immersion anyway unless you sit motionlessly on a pier (so you don't notice the clipping) and fish.
realism and immersion are two different things.
In a movie like Star Wars, 300 , Alice in Wonderland people became immersed in an unrealistic environment.
Also movies like The Patriot/ Braveheart/ or King Arthur which had a realistic enivornment it was possible to be immersed.
The trick to immersion whether the gameplay is realistic or not is to make it fun. Fishing in wow is boring as hell to me but playing the fishing games with the controller rod on PS 2 was absolutely fun.
The problem is people don't talk in old english and if you make them your immersion is going to be ruined in another respect, lack of population as people will leave and play WoW where they can say whatever they want....
Presentation for new MMORPG economics concept http://www.slideshare.net/talin/mmo-economics-concept-v-10
Depending on my mood I vary in this from being exactly the same as your post all the the way to liking barrens chat. I don't think it would be that hard to have simple checkbox options for some of this:
1. No whispers unless grouped - maybe with a list of exceptions. A lot of people would tick this because of the gold sellers.
2. No region chat except in cities or dungeons. I'd tick something like this depending on mood.
I'd normally want to be able to make a couple of exceptions for a help channel and a LFG channel so you could uncheck region chat but keep those - assuming those channels were well policed.
Thinking about it, it does seem to come down mostly to the chat channel filtering being specific enough for what people want. I like the idea of a "no whispers unless grouped" option with an exception list. I don't think I've seen that in any game so far.
I've thought about this a lot and I don't believe that's a workable solution. Besides any ignore list limit (10 in WoW I think?), if you filter the chat yourself then that's just you doing it. It still doesn't encourage other people to go to cities and taverns to meet up and do business, and largely just gives you a reputation for being ignorant. You'll also never get a group unless you participate in these global telepathic communities.
I know I'll be in a minority about this but it's my personal bug-bear.
Not ignore, but filter. Two different things. Example: Filter off general chat when playing unless you need to ask something.
Thank you Sanya
I had a great time reading and laughing all the way through it. I can not tell you how many times I have felt the same way about crafting and questing. You see I don't play MMOs all the time, some times I like to make things in my shop out of wood. And although it is posable to cut yourself or hit your finger with an hammer, for the most part I stopped doing that along time ago. I've been making things out of wood for alittle over 25 years, so when I set down and start to make a chair, it ends up being just what I wanted it to be. I do not loss the wood (PUFF its gone),I do not come up with TWO chairs, And you can take it to the bank that I will make more money selling my chair than the cost of the wood it took to make.
Again thanks
..its a guideline, not a rule, as players we must remember: Its a Game.
I've thought about this a lot and I don't believe that's a workable solution. Besides any ignore list limit (10 in WoW I think?), if you filter the chat yourself then that's just you doing it. It still doesn't encourage other people to go to cities and taverns to meet up and do business, and largely just gives you a reputation for being ignorant. You'll also never get a group unless you participate in these global telepathic communities.
I know I'll be in a minority about this but it's my personal bug-bear.
Not ignore, but filter. Two different things. Example: Filter off general chat when playing unless you need to ask something.
Yes, I realize that but the effect is the same. It would just be me personally choosing to not the see the messages and wouldn't encourage people to hang around in social locations nor make me seem any less ignorant!
To enjoy "immersion" in a game it really helps to have absolutely zero formal education in history, geology, botany, chemistry, or meteorology or have any experience with "oldy-time" trades such as blacksmithing or be involved in any SCA chapter.
To have any of the above only ensures that you will be yanking your hair out at the apparent ignorance or outright idiocy of world and game system designers.
Drev
"If MMORPG players were around when God said, "Let their be light" they'd have called the light gay, and plunged the universe back into darkness by squatting their nutsacks over it."
-Luke McKinney, The 7 Biggest Dick Moves in the History of Online Gaming
"In the end, SWG may have been more potential and promise than fulfilled expectation. But I'd rather work on something with great potential than on fulfilling a promise of mediocrity."
-Raph Koster
Drevar, that's so true.
Immersion can mean different things but in MMO shorthand we tend to think of realism or simulation that transports us from the comfort of our homes to this alternate universe. The fact is there are very few MMOs that have even tried. To me crafting and fishing mechanics seem like symptoms of the problem more than the root issue.
I think, for me, immersive game design means the designers really understand how things do work in the real world and have as a goal creating a space where players truly feel a part of that world. However, they have to do this in a way that makes the experience enjoyable and rewarding. How's that for a vague and unhelpful couple of words? Different people find different experiences enjoyable and different kinds of kudos or bits of bling rewarding.
So let's focus on gamers who presumably want both realistic immersion (or at least plausible immersion) in a setting. How would a designer interested in immersion go about crafting or fishing?
Well, no need to reinvent the wheel. But it might be smart to look at other games beyond the genre to see how they handle things and maybe learn from why they're successful. There are fishing games out there. They may have more depth and complexity than a minigame in an MMO needs but you can pare the concept, which repeats across all titles, down to basic elements of chosing lures, casting and allowing the player "twitch" based control of the rod. That's right. Make it an action game. Keep most functional rewards limited to that minigame. The successes you have may allow access to trophies that can be decoratively displayed, meat that can be sold or used as a crafting ingredient, and perhaps have other rewards like better gear, more lures, and so forth, but it should primarily feed back into itself. No magic items. Just fish. But make those fish interesting. Make catching them challenging.
In other words, make it a game that would be worth playing on its own merits and based on somewhat realistic, if simplified, principles.
Crafting's a bit harder. You almost need that repetitious and boring element in there to weed out those who aren't as interested in being a master crafter as those who are else everyone and his brother will be a master crafter or have one as an alt - and this can create an overabundance of high end goods on the market. Goods created have to have a real function in the game and, in a perfect crafting game, must be superior to anything that can be scrounged as dropped loot. Complexity is what made crafting so interesting to those who loved it in old school SWG and to this day most player-crafters constantly cite it as the best crafting game ever. In SWG you could really dig into resource stats, develop your own high end tools (or buy them) to make the best product, create networks of suppliers for resources and subcomponents. Much of the grindwork, once you got past a certain point, could be managed by using item blueprints in factories or setting mining rigs up to draw in resources from an ever changing pool of geographically positioned raw materials. And those materials themselves had a host of traits which made keeping track of them and stockpiling reserves against shortages a very key thing.
If someone got good at this they'd become famous. In all cases the crafter's name was stuck on the items he made and usually established "brands" of very high end goods would be custom named in order to further set them apart on the market.
How many other games would let a crafter become that famous or sought after? Very few if any. In all other games crafting is a cookiecutter activity that produces generic rewards.
That doesn't help alleviate the grinding issue and certainly factors like encumbrance can be a pain. But instead of eliminating it I'd include wagons in the universe. Load it up and haul your stuff around as needed. One of SWG's big failings was a lack of rhyme or reason in the space portion of the game. People could just teleport from world to world and carry as much stuff as they wanted, almost, while doing it. So when space ships finally showed up nobody needed them to haul goods or passengers. Imagine Han Solo trying to make a living in that universe. Conversely we see in Eve Online that a huge amount of the gameplay comes from, not just PvP, but from the adventures that arise naturally from logistics and transport across long (and time consuming) distances. It's not always exciting in High Sec, though many long haulers have fun chatting/roleplaying with friends as they fly, but in Low Sec or 0.0 things get far more interesting and risky.
Always notice what you notice.
Here's an old article on Immersion, literally called "On Immersion", from my blog. It's a roleplayer's perspective on the topic but many of my blog entries touch on the subject because it's just that important.
http://www.mmorpg.com/blogs/OddjobXL/022009/3374_On-Immersion
"Immersion is a loaded word with different meanings for different folks but it's one I'll sit down and discuss with you.
What? I can't sit? That's not a good sign. A sitting avatar often means, in roleplayese, "Sit down and talk to me." Nonroleplayers tend to be rushing around everywhere, places to go and things to kill, but roleplayers love a cozy setting where they can plop their bums down and just do their thing. Not being able to sit immediately reminds a player his avatar is just a character in a game and, when that happens, poof goes immersion. It's the canary in the coal mine - either a developer gets this off the bat or he probably is missing alot of other stuff roleplayers look for.
Immersive elements include setting, control, dynamism and simulation...."
And it goes on from there.
Always notice what you notice.
Heh, a rant. I should know, I'm a ranter myself.
Developers playtest EVE, we all know how that ended (cough, cheating, cough, exploiting, cough). Besides if management tells them to do things they will do it and make that little script that fills the gap. But have no fear, games like that die and you get to try a new one, free market is working in world of mmos. If you don't like WOW you just don't play it, simple as that. If a game starts annoying you instead of making you glad you played it it's time to move on.
Besides we all know that 99% of developers never ever tests their code out. Ever! Any industry in the world. This is why QA teams are huge for all who want to make a quality product.
No fate but what we make, so make me a ham sandwich please.
From what was discussed in that article, immersion sound pretty expensive.
I think my post was more intended to explore the subject than offer practical solutions. A new pair of eyes for how to view MMO design when thinking about immersion. If it worked on that level I might have succeeded. If not, no harm in trying.
Always notice what you notice.
Excellent article, Sanya, as always.
I find your point about faliure and level of expertise in crafting is very true, but so is the risk element your friend states crafters need. To a point, you're both right.
If you haven't played UO in a while, do so, if for no other reason than crafting. It's the perfect blend, in my opinion, of what crafting in a game SHOULD be.
1) Lots of harvesting for gains. This may sound dull, but it's done in such a way that you get a decent quantity very quickly. How realistic is it that you can advance your skill, as a crafter, with 2 pieces of metal?
2) You do fail and lose materials. A lot. This makes sense because, hey, you're LEARNING the trade. You're going to make mistakes. Ever have to make a set of toaster tongs in shop class in high-school? If you mess up, that piece of wood you messed up with isn't going to be used for anything else, save tooth picks.
3) When you master a carft, the lower level stuff is almost gaurnteed to not fail. As you said, it makes sense, that higher level stuff even a master can struggle with, but entry-level items and equipment are easily done.
4) There's a LOT more control and diversity in crafting coming with the new UO expansion, Stygian Abyss. Imbuing is just one aspect.
5) Variety. Carpentry, Tinkering, Blacksmithing, Tailoring, Alchemy, Fletching, Cooking, soon Imbuing. So many different crafts, for so many different purposes, from the standard equipment and potions, to stuff that's just pure marzipan for housing.
It's for these reasons that I think UO has the best elements of both realism and practicality in a game's crafting system that you simply can't find anywhere else. Crafting is the chief reason I still play UO to this day. I love it. I love the slowness, the steady pace of it. It's cathartic. It's something you do because you love to do it, not because you need to. And the fact that I feel the community is so much better than other games I've played (At least he community I'm in, in terms of guild, server, etc.), and RP is more prevelant in that community (Again, the one I play in) doesn't hurt either.
I think that's why games shouldn't aim at realism but only at an impression of realism e.g woodwork crafting needing a plane or a saw tool as a re-usable component but never explicitly being used. It should be very impressionistic and aimed at creating the *feeling* of realism not the actuality.
Yes, make managing the weight issue part of the process - pack animal, cart, wagon. hired porters etc.
Immersion...
I want the computer's operating system to mearly be the means for my avatar to travel through cyberspace from one game world to another.
Life is a game, xcept there are no 1ups.
Which Final Fantasy Character Are You?
Final Fantasy 7
Liek o.O;; WTF!!
Vanguard's harvesting and crafting system is excellent. Tabula Rasa never got to have a crafting system because they pushed the game out before it was ready.
Both of them are not failures of game design, but both were victims of being pushed out half finished. In the case of vanguard, microsoft had a change of priorities to the Xbox and cut off funding. In tabulsa Rasa, although the game had been in development for so long, the game had actually be redesigned a couple times and the version we got had the core of an awesome game it just needed another year in development to actually realize it's potential.
The number one immersion killer these days is *drum roll*
Instancing
How can you possibly explain having the exact same looking area duplicated in the same world? You can't and it is the devs lazy way of handling more load. Just create X number of identical clone zones! yaaay
Some games are ok when it comes to instancing but when it comes to games like AoC, which holds only about 50 people before popping another instanced, I doubt I can still call them MMORPGs.
My gaming blog
beta testing, play testing. i don't think half the mmo producers know what beta testing is.
You know, where you just reset the server every so often and wipe everything, or set up users in a random level for a while, let them run about as that level, then wipe the characters stats at the end of the week as if they never existed. Because it's not as if these accounts are real things and the people using them think they are playing the real game.
Or put in beta-only devices into the world that allow players to change their level or class or stats with a click. To fiddle and see if there's less nerfing after a particular level, or if something is fair in one class or another. And then wipe the results clean as if they never existed at the end of the week. It's not like you'll be pissing off players since it's a BETA test and they won't be paying for it. An idea for the developer to gain feedback would be to have a "rate this quest" star system in the beta on each quest, or a "exciting/annoying" button you could press on a script/npc to tally stats on what you think of it during that phase of the testing.
You the developer get feedback and see how people play and statistics and everything you need.
Because nobody who participates in a beta of a game would actually be silly enough to believe they were "playing" the "real thing" would they?
Forum signatures are stupid and annoying. I've turned mine off.
Well, if each dungeon is only used once or if the dungeons are randomly generated then there are even worse problems than instancing to worry about. It is not out of laziness, but out of practicality and production cost.
Randomly generated dungeons might sound like a good idea, but in reality it can only be used to a certain extent. All randomly generated dungeons are based on a set of parameters, and these parameters cannot be too complex other wise the dungeon will just be one big zone full of bugs and errors. However if it is simple, then then players might not be entertained after a few times through.
If the developer keep designing a new dungeon every week, then the cost of maintaining a game becomes sky high. Maybe if they charge each player $100 dollar a month this could be easily remedied, but I doubt anyone will pay that price to simply have new dungeons to go through every few days.
If a developer can find a cost effective solution to instancing I am sure they would jump at it, but for now they will stick with instancing more often than not.
I don't think randomized systems need to be buggy or boring. We see randomized gameplay in singleplayer games that keeps them alive for decades - one can point to Daggerfall as an example of bad randomization or to X-Com or Civilization or even The Sims as Exhibit A for how to do it right. Isn't the goal of an MMO to maintain longevity and to retain customers over a long haul? Isn't the biggest complaint often the lack of "end game" content? The popularity of PvP with MMO designers is in no small part due to the fact that it's got relatively low overhead from their point of view and keeps players, who like that sort of thing, entertained. However we know this to be a fairly modest subset of the market and even PvPers want PvE content that isn't boring and mindless. In fact, most PvPers will defend PvP gameplay by pointing out just how repetitious and unrewarding, in terms of fun or challenge, PvE gameplay often is in MMOs.
Yes, good randomized or dynamic systems will require a heavy front-end investment because getting them wrong would be worse than not having them at all. Get them right, on the other hand, could for once give us gameplay in an MMO that resembles actual game-like gameplay! Even more important that variability does breed immersion. If you can't just sleepwalk through a generic situation because you've done it 500 times before and have memorized the gamefaq then suddenly what's actually happening before your eyes matters enough to get you to disable the macros and put guildchat on hold while you pay attention to what's going on. That's immersion, baby.
Always notice what you notice.
Good to see Sanya is back to that terrible whiny writing style she started with, the type that is irritating to even read.
So to sum this up, Sanya wants a game that is easy mode and always rewards her but never punishes her. If she makes a mistake she wants the game to say hey don't worry about it, no such things as mistakes so here your stuff back try again.
The game she is asking for would be the worst game ever, no penalty to crafting so then every item is worthless because there's no risk in making them, everyone can and no one loses any materials on failing. Terrible that a person who works for a site called MMORPG wants such a non MMORPG.
And to complain about some ambient noises? Really? Who cares, and for that matter if you are waiting for the creature that only spawns at night to come back, uh well come back at night don't just stand there when it just turned day for it to turn night again.
This literally is one of the worst columns I have ever read.
I have to laugh when I think how many of these "problems" can be answered with one word: EVE. While certainly not without its problems, it does address all of these quite well:
Instancing - deadspace complexes are handled separately but still exist in "real space". They require special probes for other players to find (and ninja salvage if they want to), but they can be found. And their whole existance is explained nicely as some sort of subspace phenomena. Aside from this, EVE doesn't make use of much "instancing" and is the only MMO (afaik) where every single player is in the same realm.
Manufacturing - is always successful as long as you a) have the prerequisite skills (which sometimes take YEARS to acquire -literally) and b) materials (which can also be a challenge sometimes, as some things REQUIRE items you can only get as drops - kind of chiken-eggish, no?). Too bad its as boring as heck and the outcome is always the same (plop, ship, plop, another ship...). Why can't my corp make a spiffy looking Rifter than the next corp, or spend more time to make a better one, or shave off some time to make a cheaper one.
Missions - there's no standing around waiting for a mission - you can either do it now, or not do it at all. The only queues I've noticed in EVE is when a jump gate gets backlogged. Missions are fun (at first) and drop you into the combat (or situation) almost instantly. That being said, they get a little repetitve after a while (especially if you're career focussed) and have zero impact on the realm as-is (sad).
EVE has its share of problems (griefing, steep learning curve, blob-warefare, rapant piracy, mining/manufacturing-grinding, shallow character creation, lack of player customization, scamming, etc), but in these areas I have to give it credit for not falling into the MMO rut everyother game seems to be in right now.
Sanya Weathers for President!
Another great piece of work!