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Any word on questing?
Drachasor
Member Posts: 2,678
One of the nice things that is coming in Star Wars: The Old Republic (and possibly Star Trek Online) are quests where you get to make meaningful decisions that affect the outcome (such as killing a guy off or not and possibly long-term reprecussions such as a guy coming at you much later on for revenge). Any word on what FFXIV is going to have as far as questing is concerned?
Err, I know about the whole customizing your quests, which is neat, but has there been anything said beyond that?
Comments
Wow ... personally I'd hate that. I would want to get every outcome possible so if you have multiple decisions over the course of the game you can have an infinite number of outcomes potentially. To get all the endings I'd have to play through the game that many times. Since you can change you class/job in this game similarly to how you could in FFXI, I can't see them doing anything like that just because you'd have to create multiple characters which isn't really needed in its predecessor .
So it is bad if the game isn't boring if you make a new character? Replayability is bad? Nothing forces you to do it again, it is a choice -- not something needed, something you elect to do. It also gives a greater sense of importance to your decisions as a player, since what you think and do matters (to say nothing of how it is very nice for people who RP heavily in MMORPGs -- though I am not one of the latter).
Anyhow, I think you are looking at it the wrong way. It isn't about experiencing every possible iteration of such a system, but rather the fact that such a system helps make the world feel alive. You get to choose what to do and the world responds to it. You can be a good guy and just do good stuff, a bad guy and do vile stuff, or something in-between. Anyhow, I never said anything about the endings being different (do MMORPGs even really have endings?) Obviously the main quest lines are going to have to be similar (at least enough for the movies they'll have to all match up), but if you could make choices on the way to give your particular guy some character of your own choosing, then that seems like good stuff to me. Maybe most consequences would fit in outside of the main quests (or could even be fit into the "choose your quest" system, where you can choose at add some kind of RP element to up the difficulty or something).
In an FF game, it would obviously have to be different than Star Wars. FF typically has only had hero PCs (well, some anti-heroes, but those are heroes of a sort). So, let's take FFIV as an example of characters. You could make choices to reflect a dark origin (Cecil) who is trying to do better (or unlike Cecil maybe you stay pretty dark, but still hate the bad guys so you go after them anyhow). Or you could be like Edge and try to be somewhat of a womanizer (as much as FF allows, of course). Or you could be like Tellah and be a grumpy guy who does what he feels he must. Having choices in quests that let you reflect that and then having NPCs react to your unique reputation at the very least would be nice. Extra nice would be having that reputation you have garnered optionally affect how quests work would be even nicer.
That said, so far I haven't seen any sign they are doing something like this, but it would be cool if they did.
So it is bad if the game isn't boring if you make a new character? Replayability is bad?
I cut this section of your post to highlight it. Have you ever played FFXI? If not, it allowed you to have one character that could switch between all the jobs (classes) and do everything in game with one single character (granted it would take you in insane amount of time to do it all either way). Since FFXIV is essentially FFXI's successor, it's based off the same basic principles.
So it is bad if the game isn't boring if you make a new character? Replayability is bad?
I cut this section of your post to highlight it. Have you ever played FFXI? If not, it allowed you to have one character that could switch between all the jobs (classes) and do everything in game with one single character (granted it would take you in insane amount of time to do it all either way). Since FFXIV is essentially FFXI's successor, it's based off the same basic principles.
Yes, I have played FFXI. I think we disagree on what principles from it should be kept. Job switching is good. Being able to do all the story quests as one character is good. I don't see why it has to go further than that. I don't see why you object for the game to enable roleplaying during a quest when it is a roleplaying game. Pretty much all FF games have been known for their strong characters, so why shouldn't that principle be carried over to player characters in FFXIV?
So it is bad if the game isn't boring if you make a new character? Replayability is bad? Nothing forces you to do it again, it is a choice -- not something needed, something you elect to do. It also gives a greater sense of importance to your decisions as a player, since what you think and do matters (to say nothing of how it is very nice for people who RP heavily in MMORPGs -- though I am not one of the latter).
Anyhow, I think you are looking at it the wrong way. It isn't about experiencing every possible iteration of such a system, but rather the fact that such a system helps make the world feel alive. You get to choose what to do and the world responds to it. You can be a good guy and just do good stuff, a bad guy and do vile stuff, or something in-between. Anyhow, I never said anything about the endings being different (do MMORPGs even really have endings?) Obviously the main quest lines are going to have to be similar (at least enough for the movies they'll have to all match up), but if you could make choices on the way to give your particular guy some character of your own choosing, then that seems like good stuff to me. Maybe most consequences would fit in outside of the main quests (or could even be fit into the "choose your quest" system, where you can choose at add some kind of RP element to up the difficulty or something).
In an FF game, it would obviously have to be different than Star Wars. FF typically has only had hero PCs (well, some anti-heroes, but those are heroes of a sort). So, let's take FFIV as an example of characters. You could make choices to reflect a dark origin (Cecil) who is trying to do better (or unlike Cecil maybe you stay pretty dark, but still hate the bad guys so you go after them anyhow). Or you could be like Edge and try to be somewhat of a womanizer (as much as FF allows, of course). Or you could be like Tellah and be a grumpy guy who does what he feels he must. Having choices in quests that let you reflect that and then having NPCs react to your unique reputation at the very least would be nice. Extra nice would be having that reputation you have garnered optionally affect how quests work would be even nicer.
That said, so far I haven't seen any sign they are doing something like this, but it would be cool if they did.
Like I said ... I would hate it ... Personally it would kill me if I was at a crossroads in my path where two separate outcomes would be possible just because I'd be kicking myself thinking the grass might have been greener on the other side.
Generally when you have something like they it is a morality system. Using inFamous as an example. You could either run around Empire City helping everyone you could, causing tones of havoc, or just staying in between. All good an fine, but the problem comes with you could only unlock certain powers and certain trophies if you were really good or if you were really bad. I played through that game once playing on good I couldn't bring myself to go play it again on bad to achievement whore it. I played bad for an hour until I sent it back to Game Fly. It got very stale very quickly.
When programmers add in morality systems is it to increase replayability in games that wouldn't normally be good to play through again because if a game has (for example) only 6 hours of play time you won't be as willing to pay full price for it, but if you have 2 or 3 morality trees you can end up with a 12 or 18 hour game for $60 which seems like it is more value for your money, but in reality the game play is just stale. The only game that has this kind of system that really got me to play again was Fallout 3. Even though that game is amazing I still would have had trouble picking it up a fourth time doing to same missions over an over again just to get one or two different trophies.
In an MMO you are embroiled in a world that is constantly moving and changing. If it is done right you shouldn't feel very stale. I mean I have kept my character in a single spot in FFXI for 12 hours straight once (a 12 hour party in the Labyrinth of Onzozo back in the day people actually partied there). And seriously ... didn't move an inch since I was a BLM and didn't need to necessarily move. Even that day -- or the macrocosm of getting to 75 multiple times -- crap never really got stale because this MMO was done right. I mean how many times can you cast the same three spells before healing then casting the same three again?
Also take into account that in an MMO you are with your fellow players trying to achieve a common goal. With that in mind you are going to need to find people with a like mind and morality choices to help you achieve them. Take for instance the Treasures expansion. If you had a morality choice in there where you could side with either the Grand Vizier or you could side with the Empress. If you ended up siding with the Vizier you wouldn't be fighting Alexandre at the end of Treasures ... It wouldn't make sense. It also wouldn't make sense for anyone who sided with the Empress to come in and help you fight whoever you would at the end because you chose the "bad guys."
Also one of my arguments why Dragon Age Origins would not make a good MMO ...
So if I kill him off is he also permanently dead to you? Either way thats kind of bogus. Unless they will include different quests and quest npc's for every player, and I dont really see that happening. On the fly quest generation didnt work all that well in elder scrolls and that was single player. Players affecting the world is great in theory, but there are practical problems.