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What is Innovative ? Where do you want "Innovation" applied?
MMOExposed
Member RarePosts: 7,400
What is Innovative?
This is a commonly used term used here in this forum. But is it really as great as we make it out to be?
If I take a Druid, and change the name to Ranger. Is that Innovative?
Reminds me of GW2's Ranger class. Very Similar to Druid concept.
What about the Mesmer? Is that innovative to EQ, because of the shorter name?
(sorry if I singled out Guild Wars series)
but you get the idea.
If I take a Rogue, and lower its armor to cloth, remove its melee attacks ,and give it Shadow spells and portal summons.
Does that make it innovative? Seems like a Shadow Mage but with a different name.
What if I take a Paladin, and rename it something else. Is it now acceptable by the MMORPG community as being innovative?
well what is Innovative in your book? Where would you like to see this "Innovation" applied in this genre of gaming? you can scream for it all you want, but until you say where specifically you want it, your cries mean little. So where?
Philosophy of MMO Game Design
Comments
Innovation is anything that makes the experience feel substantially different to the user. (The magnitude of difference determines the magnitude the user believes a feature to be innovation.)
Like most of life, 80% or more of new ideas suck. It's easy to create new ideas, but unless you create a lot of them and do it smart, you won't create those 20% of non-suck innovative ideas (and it's more than just coming up with great ideas; it's the full execution of the idea from inception to final execution.)
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
Innovation
^ "The central meaning of innovation thus relates to renewal or improvement, with novelty being a consequence of this improvement. For an improvement to take place it is necessary for people to change the way they make decisions, or make choices outside of their norm."
First one must recognize what needs to be improved. However, the only way one can do this is by making choices "outside of the norm". The problem is that a majority of people involved with the MMO industry don't see a reason to "improve" anything. Subscriptions are booming and yearly revenue for MMO's is fairly high, therefor from a business perspective nothing needs "improvement". This doesn't make it true, as MMO's could definately use some innovation and there's always room for improvement.
Most people go through life pretending to be a boss. I go through life pretending I'm not.
Also innovation isn't just about classes. As a matter of fact it's hard to be truely innovative in that area and I honestly don't see any reason to be either. However, questing, sandbox elements, more freedom/hardcore PvP, less gear grinding and instances are a few things I can think of that could use some innovation. Just my opinion though.
Most people go through life pretending to be a boss. I go through life pretending I'm not.
Innovation in MMOs to me would be to move the game away from being a game and more of a simulated world. I think in order to do that, players would need to be able to have multiple characters in the world at the same time doing things. For example, you might want to play a soldier, a crafter, a merchant, and an adventurer but no one wants to play these roles all the time. Today's MMO schema is that every player tries to make a few characters that encompass everything in the game. I propose allowing the players to have multiple and very specialized characters that can be under their control or be allowed to follow preset instructions. Using a 'House' concept, the players main avatar (who could not die permanently) would be a lord or some type of leader. Every other avatar would be a follower of the main and could suffer PD. Make combat a part of the game but not the whole game. Add strategic political, economic and military elements which would create a living, breathing world with meaningful content. Base power and social standing on RL things- economic, poltical and military power. Allow the player to also step into mundane roles- farmers and shopkeeps for example- if they so desire. Allow all the players avatars to be active in the world ( not necessarily graphical) at all times. The player might be controlling his adventuring avatar but at the same time his farmer is still producing food, his merchant is still buying and selling, his soldier in the king's army is in training and his lord is making back room deals. Lastly, I would love to see a game world that is even remotely believable whehter it used this concept or not. That alone would be innovative.
Most people don't want to live a virtual life, they want to play a game.
Most people go through life pretending to be a boss. I go through life pretending I'm not.
I honestly want innovation applied to sandboxes. I won't go into too much detail, but as an old school mmoer I miss the days of create what you will. In todays games, more often then not, you basically see players advancing along x number of paths with each and every one arriving at the same end game construct even though the players are led to believe they might be unique in pursuing their path. I hate to throw it out there, since its long gone, but pre-nge SWG is what I would like to see in terms of variety and innovation. You could mix and match there and chances were that you were among only a few that were like you. I read a lot about the holy trinity, but to be honest if ever there were a game that said eff you to the holy three Pre-NGE SWG was it and I would like to see that come back to MMO's/
Retired: EVE, SWG, STO, EQ2, Ryzom, AO, LotRO, FFXI
Currently Awaiting: SWTOR, TSW, ArcheAge
Heh , it's funny you ask such a question , because I'd really like to see innovation in the people actually playing the games to go beyond their ignorance and acknowledgeing that a game ain't solely based on realistic graphics. Perhaps then and only then will we see awesome MMO's being released.
Whats sad is the old MMO's are more Innovative than the new ones. just with old graphics so the majority doesnt play them =(
Innovation is if you think about things that havent been done before, then implement them.
Giving new names to classes that already exist is pointless, not innovative. You dont really change anything, only confuse the player with buzzwords.
Innovation is taking something and changing it by improving upon it.
Doing something that hasn't been done before is invention.
I disagree. Innovation and invention is the same thing.
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/innovative
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/invent
I wasn't posting my opinion. I was posting fact. Innovation is taking something and improving upon it. Invention is to create something original (read: doing things that haven't been done before).
Ok, then there is no such thing as invention at all.
For the guy who invented the wheel simply took existing things and made them round. Same for really every single invention afterwards.
I say who uses "invention" and who used "innovation" depends mostly upon the person in question. They are pretty much the same thing.
Innovation to me is creating new, or expanding on existing systems by adding depth. We've seen a lot of "innovation" recently in the ACTION / COMBAT space of MMORPGs as this has been the focus of the new casual MMORPG crowd.
What I'd like to see is more innovation in the game WORLD. I remember an interview w/ Richard Garriot on his original ideas for Ultima Online and he talked about wanting to implement a complex monster / animal spawning system. Some rabbits (small prey) would spawn somewhere that would cause wolfs to migrate toward the rabbit population. Larget preditors would then migrate to where the small preditors would be. Then Trolls / Orges would migrate to where the large preditors would be, etc. With the limited technology in the mid-late 90s, he wasn't able to achieve this. I think games like Xyson are trying to pick up the torch on this kind of spawning dymanics.
Arche Age has a really cool player housing system that allows you to plant gardens & trees around your house for harvesting. Birds land in the tree and make nests. You can then harvest the eggs and cook them for food to eat or sell.
Darkfall prommised (but to my knowledge didn't deliver) an interesting aggro mechanic that took into account wind direction. If a monster was down wind of your player, the monster would catch your "scent" farther away and would tip them off of your presense earlier than they would have with a static aggro aura.
Given all that, I'd like to see more innovation in real world simulation in a fantasy / sci-fi environment than innovation in streamlining combat / action mechanics
Yeesh, would you like to install my fence in back yard this weekend or mow my lawn=) How the heck can people find fun in most of that above? Some of it like the wind direction thing, can be simply tied into a agro circle. Do we need a Flag blowing on our screen to keep track of wind direction or should we have a /lick thumb and put in air emote that tests it, hehe. Harvesting eggs and eating them? For what? Do we need a mingame where you carefully insert the fork into your mouth. That'll be fun=) Pay a monthly fee to do landscaping? Crap, go outside and sweat in the sun for a few hours and virtual landscaping suddenly doesn't become something you PAY to do. You pay OTHERS to do it, because its work.
And here is the disconnect between the new casual MMORPG playerbase & the traditional MMORPG playerbase. This is also why we have seen little developed in the MMO space outside of action combat. If the biggest section of the new MMORPG playerbase wants to turn MMORPG gaming into nothing more than a glorified Diablo III w/ a chat lobby....then thats what the developers will deliver.
Once upon a time, there were people who played MMORPG games to live out a virtual life, in a virtual community because they wanted something deeper than what RPGs and other casual games had to offer. If I wanted a Hero experience in a world that revolved around my character, and had smooth awe inspiring action based combat....I'd play a RPG.
How can people find those game mechanics I mentioned above fun?
Because not everyone is like YOU. Not all MMORPG gamers in the market are casual gamers just looking for a quick fix. Some people are looking for a deep community experience where there is a place for a master cook that can cook and sell food to people who chose to put their skills in adventuring....you know, like how people used to interact in a barter system.
And for the record, building a house and harvesting a garden is not equivallent to building your fence in real life. There are people who might lead the life of a professional business man from 9-5 and wants to come home and log in to a world where they can be something different. "Pwning" some noob with a double back flip over the head axe blow is NOT the only way people have "fun" or blow off steam.
Let's start by hiring some professional Dungeon Masters. I'm tired of static linear quest/dungeon grinding.
Vault-Tec analysts have concluded that the odds of worldwide nuclear armaggeddon this decade are 17,143,762... to 1.
I'd like to see bigger mmo's make guilds mean something more. While I still support multi-guild systems like we've talked about before (being a member of guilds for different purposes--raiding guild, casual "friendly guild", crafting guild--if you chose.).
Guild Housing - Guild shops so you could earn some income from guildies, put some money to the bank, and perhaps give guildies a good deal.
More control over social events by the GM. You've been able to design tracks in some games as far back as SNES or PS1, surely they can give us an instance where the GM can set something fun up. Why not?
These would actually go hand in hand with "multiple guilds" if they so chose.
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I'm a fan of tanking and healing so I don't want to see the Trinity destroyed but games do well I think to give us combat healers and buffing classes.
RIFT is probably a step in that direction if they could balance specs better. Need buffs from (uh, the rogue buff spec...forgot the name)? Have your tank switch his subtrees. Having so many people with access to buffs makes it easier for the devs to expect the raid to have the buffs and you don't get what we saw in WoW.. shamans getting in raids noone else could just because they had bloodlust. Everyone who ever pugged before Cata has carried a shaman at least once.
//
Player Housing - It's part of the immersion. A place to store trophies of the past. FFXI's housing sucked but they had one neat thing, mannequins that you could display armor "sets" on by placing the gear on the mannequin (set being any combination of armor so you could just put your favorite gear on there.
//
Voice Chat - Who is doing it right? Vent is fantastic but why do we need it? Why are only the people with fancy keyboards/dual monitors able to comfortably see whose keying up?
//
Combat - Tab targeting is archaic and I'm glad to see more games getting away from it but still so many games stick to it. If you want to target something and lock-on/have that be your primary focus, that's fine but attacking should be a lot more fluid than it is.
Innovation in the way we use it kind of means doing things different than WoW did despite the fact it WORKED REALLY WELL FOR BLIZZARD 7 YEARS AGO.
Spec'ing properly is a gateway drug.
12 Million People have been meter spammed in heroics.
Wouldn't it be great if for every server there were a few game masters who would change the game world on a day to day or a week to week basis. Perhaps that $15 a month would actually be worth it then.
Only a Sith deals in absolutes.
Do you really think that the people who don't find your Harvest Moon MMO idea entertaining are all "just looking for a quick fix"? You're describing a fringe of the genre, one in which intriguing gameplay is almost the lowest priority. It is quite possible for people to be interested in immersive games where they can interact with the world, and yet have no desire to play Scent Masker 2012 (now with Otter Musk potions in the cash shop!).
Back to the OPs question,
To me an inovative idea in MMORPG would be to break the common party mold. I would enjoy running a party of wizards through the world, or establishing a true theiving guild.
Traditional parties may be very effictive, but are boring as hell.
You have to love replys like these, and by love I mean sneer at in disgust . First off your only contribution to this conversation has been to post a bunch of meaningless buzzwords without giving any relevent examples to back them up. Then when this poster actually answered the OPs question with some actual concrete suggestions of his own, you immediately shoot his idea down with a pointless, and somewhat arrogant ( are you reaslly an expert on what MOST people want? Interviewed serveral million people have you?), one sentence reply. If you really want to see change in the quality and content of MMOs, you might start thinking about spending a little more time with your ears open and your mouth closed.
"Gypsies, tramps, and thieves, we were called by the Admin of the site . . . "
Innovative is when you don't create PvP that is a cluster fuck of arena based crap (or an open world cluster fuck for that matter).
Innovative is when you create a combat system that is FUN, meaning let's not sit and watch the mob die.
I guess innovative is when you create something other than the traditional MMO (aka WoW clone).
As for classes, the most interesting classes I've played in recent years would have to be Herald of Xotli and Bear Shaman (funny considering how awful the game was).
"Mr. Rothstein, your people never will understand... the way it works out here. You're all just our guests. But you act like you're at home. Let me tell you something, partner. You ain't home. But that's where we're gonna send you if it harelips the governor." - Pat Webb