The goal is to get more people to play and play more. If having a harsh death penalty encouraged players to play more, then you would see more harsh death penalties in more video games. I can accept the possibility that mmorpg designers are stupid. They don't cover a huge chunk of all the video game designers that exist. I don't find it likely that the majority of video game designers are stupid.
The goal of a game designer is ultimately to create an excellent game, even though far too many designers have forgotten that goal. A game designer should be happier with creating a less popular game that is rated 9.5/10.0 than a more popular one that is rated 8.0/10.0. One important case in which the severe death penalty was essential is the one with the single player game Demon Souls; it showed how much surplus to joy a strong death penalty could indirectly yield in the proper context.
What is the benefit to the developer in making a game that fewer people will like? Why shouldn't they make a game that more people will like and that more people will pay for?
What's the benefit to the film director in making a movie that fewer people will like? Why shouldn't they make a movie that more people will like and that more people will pay for?
--------------------
Quoting your edit: "Also, I don't disagree that developers want to create great games. It's just that 'great' is subjective and depends on what someone likes. You can create a great game without a death penalty. All other things being equal, more people will buy the game that does not have the harsh death penalty."
My reply to that is: sure you can create a great game without a death penalty. However, the current problem with MMORPGs is that developers copy too much and put too little of their own mark on the game. The amount of variation from MMORPG to MMORPG within the AAA market is simply too small, the single player RPG "AAA" market has far more variation.
You believe that a less people would buy the game if it does not have a harsh death penalty; however, that is far from being proven. A correct balance between punishment and reward may very well be what is needed to keep more people interested and the current low death penalties may be too low to be optimal.
What I do know is that Demon Souls would not be nearly as entertaining without the severe death penalty even under the condition that all other things are equal,
The goal is to get more people to play and play more. If having a harsh death penalty encouraged players to play more, then you would see more harsh death penalties in more video games. I can accept the possibility that mmorpg designers are stupid. They don't cover a huge chunk of all the video game designers that exist. I don't find it likely that the majority of video game designers are stupid.
The goal of a game designer is ultimately to create an excellent game, even though far too many designers have forgotten that goal. A game designer should be happier with creating a less popular game that is rated 9.5/10.0 than a more popular one that is rated 8.0/10.0. One important case in which the severe death penalty was essential is the one with the single player game Demon Souls; it showed how much surplus to joy a strong death penalty could indirectly yield in the proper context.
What is the benefit to the developer in making a game that fewer people will like? Why shouldn't they make a game that more people will like and that more people will pay for?
What's the benefit to the film director in making a movie that fewer people will like? Why shouldn't they make a movie that more people will like and that more people will pay for?
Money? who wouldn't want to have it. Even these artsy directors sooner or later makes movies that appeal to broader audience.
You must not lose faith in humanity. Humanity is an ocean; if a few drops of the ocean are dirty, the ocean does not become dirty -- Mahatma Gandhi
The goal is to get more people to play and play more. If having a harsh death penalty encouraged players to play more, then you would see more harsh death penalties in more video games. I can accept the possibility that mmorpg designers are stupid. They don't cover a huge chunk of all the video game designers that exist. I don't find it likely that the majority of video game designers are stupid.
The goal of a game designer is ultimately to create an excellent game, even though far too many designers have forgotten that goal. A game designer should be happier with creating a less popular game that is rated 9.5/10.0 than a more popular one that is rated 8.0/10.0. One important case in which the severe death penalty was essential is the one with the single player game Demon Souls; it showed how much surplus to joy a strong death penalty could indirectly yield in the proper context.
What is the benefit to the developer in making a game that fewer people will like? Why shouldn't they make a game that more people will like and that more people will pay for?
What's the benefit to the film director in making a movie that fewer people will like? Why shouldn't they make a movie that more people will like and that more people will pay for?
Money? who wouldn't want to have it. Even these artsy directors sooner or later makes movies that appeal to broader audience.
No, some of the greatest "artsy directors" stayed true to their art throughout their whole careers. Two fine examples: Ingmar Bergman and Federico Fellini.
The goal is to get more people to play and play more. If having a harsh death penalty encouraged players to play more, then you would see more harsh death penalties in more video games. I can accept the possibility that mmorpg designers are stupid. They don't cover a huge chunk of all the video game designers that exist. I don't find it likely that the majority of video game designers are stupid.
The goal of a game designer is ultimately to create an excellent game, even though far too many designers have forgotten that goal. A game designer should be happier with creating a less popular game that is rated 9.5/10.0 than a more popular one that is rated 8.0/10.0. One important case in which the severe death penalty was essential is the one with the single player game Demon Souls; it showed how much surplus to joy a strong death penalty could indirectly yield in the proper context.
What is the benefit to the developer in making a game that fewer people will like? Why shouldn't they make a game that more people will like and that more people will pay for?
What's the benefit to the film director in making a movie that fewer people will like? Why shouldn't they make a movie that more people will like and that more people will pay for?
Money? who wouldn't want to have it. Even these artsy directors sooner or later makes movies that appeal to broader audience.
Stanley Kubrick or Michael Bay, I wonder who is the most highly regarded director and who aspiring directors would like to become if they had to choose.
I think it's obviously a personal opinion and I could really take it or leave it. I've played games with harsh dp and games with none and it never really changed how I played the game, who I grouped with or anything else.
What did change it for me was full loot drop on death... man... that REALLY made you want to not get killed. The XP hit didn't really bother me. You got it all back, or most of it on the corpse run, but in shadowbane, loosing all my money and runes pissed me off to no end. Made it more fun.
I've updated my equation, but I think respawning with a fraction of health in a large area of high radius hostile mobs is worse than reviving cloaked and thus untouchable so you can easily get into a safe place. I also think dying more than once an hour is incredibly unlikely until end game.
Plus anyone can revive in a group, so thats only an issue if you all die. Unlike WoW.
Stretch the actuals much? You have much more of a chance of dieing twice in an hour while leveling than the chance of not being able to find a safe spot to rez in the MASSIVE radious around your corpse in WoW (not to mention that you respawn with an even smaller fraction of health in SWTOR).
Matter of fact, I have died more than twice in an hour trying to take on multiple elites (by mistake), yet I literally cannot remember a time in my 4 years of WoW playing where i was not able to res safely away from danger...
Your "anyone can res you" is a moot point, the same limitations/Pros apply to WoW: You need to be near someone who can kill whatever killed you, plus anyone in wow can res you as well (3/4ths of wow classes have a rez, plus guild res can be used by any class in the game), so you obviously have not played since Cata's release. Again, this post should have been about the lax death penalties in modern MMOs in general, not the "lack of penalty in SWTOR".
As others have pointed out, this has been a common issue in almost every MMO released in the last 7 years....to try to imply that SWTOR some how "went further" is either a huge stretch of the truth to push an anti TOR agenta, or just plain trolling.
ill just post here real quick that i agree with you even though i forsee axehilt posting here soon saying something about rose colored glasses and how those were worthless timesinks
What else were they? How can people not see them for what they were, they kept you playing (read paying) longer.
It's no secret that most MMO players (fans) will finish out the leveling game, been that way since the start. The longer you make that, and the more you set back those trying to achieve and the more you give them to "achieve", the longer they will play.
They do the same thing today, except instead of grinding numbers, you're grinding for items ( gear) (read: MMO companies learned a thing or two from diablo).
I disagree...
Every opponent of harsher death penalties will always argue that they do nothing but make you spend more time, and don't really change gameplay at all. This is just so wrong.
I encourage all of you guys to play Dark Souls, Minecraft, or Terraria.
All of those games have severe death penalties and it DRASTICALLY changes the way the game is played. In Minecraft, if you die you drop all your stuff on your person and may very well lose it. Believe me, this makes you EXTRA CAUTIOUS when you are digging down to make sure you don't fall in lava, or digging up to make sure you don't flood your tunnel.
And in Dark Souls, if you die you lose all of your current "souls" (spendable exp) and have to start back at a checkpoint that can be far away. Believe me...it makes you think critically about each fight you engage. Instead of just running in blindly and hoping to win, you will always tactically assess the situation beforehand and try to figure out the best way to handle it. You're always EXTREMELY cautious when traveling to a new area because you never know what kind of nasty surprises await you.
The death penalty in these games define the play experience. Without it, I wouldn't care about digging into lava in Minecraft...I would just dig where I want, and if I die? Who cares. And in Dark Souls, I would just run through the levels repeatedly bashing my head against each fight until I win. The element of caution, danger, and planning would be gone from each of these games.
I'm not saying that harsher death penalties are always the best thing, but they DO change the play experience, and they CAN add something meaningful to a game.
The "death penalties just make you grind more" argument only works if you assume that the player has absolutely no control over whether or not they die. Because, if this were true, then death would be completely random and essentially just an exp-sink. This is never the case in video games.
My first MMORPG was Everquest 1. The death penalty in EQ was very harsh. Corpse runs, lost equipment, massive xp hit. Then WoW turned up and toned it down a lot, simple short corpse runs, slight money hit. I personally prefered EQs style since it made the game incredibly tense, with real strategy required. I can see why some people thought it was too hard however, and WoW was certainly more accessible because of this.
However, there is no death penalty at all in SWTOR (waiting 10 seconds isn't a punishment). This makes the game so easy, I may aswell just be clicking for 50 hours or so. I only die when I forget to heal after 50 or so enemies, and then I just get to respawn on the spot, stealthed, no xp hit, no stat damage, nothing. I play games for the challenge, but I find very little challenge in SWTOR, which is a shame because it has lots of great features and ideas.
I personally feel that devs making games easier to appeal to more people is ruining the games, at least for me.
Am I alone in this?
So punish yourself when you die. Eat a can of dog food or trash one item your character is wearing. Don't sit around waiting for the devs to do everything for you; get creative.
Kyleran: "Now there's the real trick, learning to accept and enjoy a game for what
it offers rather than pass on what might be a great playing experience
because it lacks a few features you prefer."
John Henry Newman: "A man would do nothing if he waited until he could do it so well that no one could find fault."
FreddyNoNose: "A good game needs no defense; a bad game has no defense." "Easily digested content is just as easily forgotten."
LacedOpium: "So the question that begs to be asked is, if you are not interested in
the game mechanics that define the MMORPG genre, then why are you
playing an MMORPG?"
My first MMORPG was Everquest 1. The death penalty in EQ was very harsh. Corpse runs, lost equipment, massive xp hit. Then WoW turned up and toned it down a lot, simple short corpse runs, slight money hit. I personally prefered EQs style since it made the game incredibly tense, with real strategy required. I can see why some people thought it was too hard however, and WoW was certainly more accessible because of this.
However, there is no death penalty at all in SWTOR (waiting 10 seconds isn't a punishment). This makes the game so easy, I may aswell just be clicking for 50 hours or so. I only die when I forget to heal after 50 or so enemies, and then I just get to respawn on the spot, stealthed, no xp hit, no stat damage, nothing. I play games for the challenge, but I find very little challenge in SWTOR, which is a shame because it has lots of great features and ideas.
I personally feel that devs making games easier to appeal to more people is ruining the games, at least for me.
Am I alone in this?
So punish yourself when you die. Eat a can of dog food or trash one item your character is wearing. Don't sit around waiting for the devs to do everything for you; get creative.
That would work to a certain extent if it was a single player game. SWTOR is though a co-op game, so unless you make your allies eat the can too, it isn't as effective. Also it significantely breaks immersion, which is bad.
This is the main reason why i cancelled my sub. This game was so easy it was a joke. If something kills you, you just respawn right where you died. No lost xp, no lost items. LOL. I think a trained monkey could solo to the level cap. And no i did not do hard mode instances. Why? Because I play mmorpg's for world pvp. World pvp in SWTOR is meaningless, even worse than WOW.
There was a time when video games were challenging. Now they almost play themselves. Games are supposed to be fun, but for a lot of people, that means challenging. I wouldn't play Hello Kitty Island Adventure because it is designed for kids and is thus way too easy for me to have fun playing.
And no i am not going to manually punish myself when i die. That is the dumbest thing i ever heard. Might as well play DnD or something if i am just going to make up my own rules concerning a game. The entire point of gaming is trying to find tactics and tricks to get around difficult video game content.
But nowadays it seems that Western gamers don't like challenging games. I am very embarrassed about this and very annoyed that it will keep a lot of great japanese games from releasing in the United States. Anyway, played SWTOR for about a week and found it to be super easy with almost no world pvp. Story is nice but it is not a substitute for poor gameplay. Anyway, back to EVE and Dark Souls for me.
Are you a Pavlovian Fish Biscuit Addict? Get Help Now! I will play no more MMORPGs until somethign good comes out!
May I please know why you are still playing EVE then? Because as long as you keep your insurance up to date, there is even less of a death penalty than TOR...
Originally posted by Creslin321 Originally posted by Distopia
Originally posted by PKJackCrow ill just post here real quick that i agree with you even though i forsee axehilt posting here soon saying something about rose colored glasses and how those were worthless timesinks
What else were they? How can people not see them for what they were, they kept you playing (read paying) longer. It's no secret that most MMO players (fans) will finish out the leveling game, been that way since the start. The longer you make that, and the more you set back those trying to achieve and the more you give them to "achieve", the longer they will play. They do the same thing today, except instead of grinding numbers, you're grinding for items ( gear) (read: MMO companies learned a thing or two from diablo). I disagree... Every opponent of harsher death penalties will always argue that they do nothing but make you spend more time, and don't really change gameplay at all. This is just so wrong. ... snip ...
I usually argue that death penalties need to match the game that they are currently active in. The death penalty from Minecraft would not make sense in WoW, and the death penalty in WoW would not make sense in Minecraft. This discussion didn't really seem to go in that direction.
But I'm not really an opponent of harsh death penalties...just an opponent of applying to them to every single new game that comes out that doesn't have one.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
ill just post here real quick that i agree with you even though i forsee axehilt posting here soon saying something about rose colored glasses and how those were worthless timesinks
What else were they? How can people not see them for what they were, they kept you playing (read paying) longer.
It's no secret that most MMO players (fans) will finish out the leveling game, been that way since the start. The longer you make that, and the more you set back those trying to achieve and the more you give them to "achieve", the longer they will play.
They do the same thing today, except instead of grinding numbers, you're grinding for items ( gear) (read: MMO companies learned a thing or two from diablo).
I disagree...
Every opponent of harsher death penalties will always argue that they do nothing but make you spend more time, and don't really change gameplay at all. This is just so wrong.
... snip ...
I usually argue that death penalties need to match the game that they are currently active in. The death penalty from Minecraft would not make sense in WoW, and the death penalty in WoW would not make sense in Minecraft. This discussion didn't really seem to go in that direction.
But I'm not really an opponent of harsh death penalties...just an opponent of applying to them to every single new game that comes out that doesn't have one.
I would also oppose applying them to every single new game that comes out that doesn't have one. What I want is variation and currently the AAA scene has too little; stronger death penalty is just one partial step one can go. Hopefully, The Secret World and Guild Wars 2 will change the staleness.
May I please know why you are still playing EVE then? Because as long as you keep your insurance up to date, there is even less of a death penalty than TOR...
Do you have any idea what you're talking about?
Not only in EvE does insurance cost a fortune, you also have to clone or lose skill points if you get capped. Plus you lose your expensive ship and all expensive equipment (unless you're not looted). Plus it will take you a long time to get back to wherever it was, not that anythin would be left. EvE is harsh death penalty.
So today's "It's cool to hate SWTOR thread" comes up with the fact that the game sucks because it doesn't have the death penalty of 12 year old EQ1 which the majority of MMO gamers don't want anyway? Oh please...
Even EQ1 doesn't have that penalty anymore, since your corpse ends up in Shadowrest instead of disappearing completely.
So today's "It's cool to hate SWTOR thread" comes up with the fact that the game sucks because it doesn't have the death penalty of 12 year old EQ1 which the majority of MMO gamers don't want anyway? Oh please...
Even EQ1 doesn't have that penalty anymore, since your corpse ends up in Shadowrest instead of disappearing completely.
Well the death penalty in this game is too light but then again so are all Themepark MMOs so you are partly right that it is not specific to SW:TOR.
However I would much rather have a harscher death penalty, maybe like a % exp loss, but only in PvE. Seeing as leveling is so quick in this game I would not see that as a big issue.
ill just post here real quick that i agree with you even though i forsee axehilt posting here soon saying something about rose colored glasses and how those were worthless timesinks
What else were they? How can people not see them for what they were, they kept you playing (read paying) longer.
It's no secret that most MMO players (fans) will finish out the leveling game, been that way since the start. The longer you make that, and the more you set back those trying to achieve and the more you give them to "achieve", the longer they will play.
They do the same thing today, except instead of grinding numbers, you're grinding for items ( gear) (read: MMO companies learned a thing or two from diablo).
I disagree...
Every opponent of harsher death penalties will always argue that they do nothing but make you spend more time, and don't really change gameplay at all. This is just so wrong.
I encourage all of you guys to play Dark Souls, Minecraft, or Terraria.
All of those games have severe death penalties and it DRASTICALLY changes the way the game is played. In Minecraft, if you die you drop all your stuff on your person and may very well lose it. Believe me, this makes you EXTRA CAUTIOUS when you are digging down to make sure you don't fall in lava, or digging up to make sure you don't flood your tunnel.
And in Dark Souls, if you die you lose all of your current "souls" (spendable exp) and have to start back at a checkpoint that can be far away. Believe me...it makes you think critically about each fight you engage. Instead of just running in blindly and hoping to win, you will always tactically assess the situation beforehand and try to figure out the best way to handle it. You're always EXTREMELY cautious when traveling to a new area because you never know what kind of nasty surprises await you.
The death penalty in these games define the play experience. Without it, I wouldn't care about digging into lava in Minecraft...I would just dig where I want, and if I die? Who cares. And in Dark Souls, I would just run through the levels repeatedly bashing my head against each fight until I win. The element of caution, danger, and planning would be gone from each of these games.
I'm not saying that harsher death penalties are always the best thing, but they DO change the play experience, and they CAN add something meaningful to a game.
The "death penalties just make you grind more" argument only works if you assume that the player has absolutely no control over whether or not they die. Because, if this were true, then death would be completely random and essentially just an exp-sink. This is never the case in video games.
Only part I dont agree with is the death is never random part. When you get PvP ganked, in some games, it is usually out of your control and random. Unless you consider being in a PvP enabled area to be something that falls under the players control about dying or not.
So today's "It's cool to hate SWTOR thread" comes up with the fact that the game sucks because it doesn't have the death penalty of 12 year old EQ1 which the majority of MMO gamers don't want anyway? Oh please...
Even EQ1 doesn't have that penalty anymore, since your corpse ends up in Shadowrest instead of disappearing completely.
Will people stop over-reacting. This is not a hate thread. At no point have I said I hate this game, and I'm not going to play it. It's just something missing from the game that I wanted to discuss.
May I please know why you are still playing EVE then? Because as long as you keep your insurance up to date, there is even less of a death penalty than TOR...
Do you have any idea what you're talking about?
Not only in EvE does insurance cost a fortune, you also have to clone or lose skill points if you get capped. Plus you lose your expensive ship and all expensive equipment (unless you're not looted). Plus it will take you a long time to get back to wherever it was, not that anythin would be left. EvE is harsh death penalty.
You are listing "posibilities" of a death penalty, which is ture, are very harsh, though if you do your stuff right (clone, insurance etc) there is almost no penalty aside from spending time claiming your insurance/clone.
I have a mining barge, have gotten killed twice, lost no skill points, and got my stuff back in less time it has taken me to do past corpse runs in WoW . Granted, if I didnt hanlde my affairs properly, I would have been F'ed.
Originally posted by PKJackCrow ill just post here real quick that i agree with you even though i forsee axehilt posting here soon saying something about rose colored glasses and how those were worthless timesinks
What else were they? How can people not see them for what they were, they kept you playing (read paying) longer. It's no secret that most MMO players (fans) will finish out the leveling game, been that way since the start. The longer you make that, and the more you set back those trying to achieve and the more you give them to "achieve", the longer they will play. They do the same thing today, except instead of grinding numbers, you're grinding for items ( gear) (read: MMO companies learned a thing or two from diablo).
I disagree... Every opponent of harsher death penalties will always argue that they do nothing but make you spend more time, and don't really change gameplay at all. This is just so wrong. ... snip ...
I usually argue that death penalties need to match the game that they are currently active in. The death penalty from Minecraft would not make sense in WoW, and the death penalty in WoW would not make sense in Minecraft. This discussion didn't really seem to go in that direction.
But I'm not really an opponent of harsh death penalties...just an opponent of applying to them to every single new game that comes out that doesn't have one.
I would also oppose applying them to every single new game that comes out that doesn't have one. What I want is variation and currently the AAA scene has too little; stronger death penalty is just one partial step one can go. Hopefully, The Secret World and Guild Wars 2 will change the staleness.
Yeah...I wouldn't hold your breath if changing the staleness involves any sort of unforgiving game play mechanics.
You might take a look at Salem or Dominus. Salem especially seems to espouse a much less forgiving play style. Salem is very much a sandbox and Dominus looks to be a spiritual successor to Dark Age of Camelot, but in space with space bugs.
** edit ** I had not noticed before now, but Dominus has opened their beta signup page.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
So today's "It's cool to hate SWTOR thread" comes up with the fact that the game sucks because it doesn't have the death penalty of 12 year old EQ1 which the majority of MMO gamers don't want anyway? Oh please...
Even EQ1 doesn't have that penalty anymore, since your corpse ends up in Shadowrest instead of disappearing completely.
Will people stop over-reacting. This is not a hate thread. At no point have I said I hate this game, and I'm not going to play it. It's just something missing from the game that I wanted to discuss.
What do you call it when you stretch the truth to imply something that is untrue?
If you wanted to discuss mickey mouse death penalties in modern MMOs, id agree 100%. The moment you start trying to imply SWTOR somehow has LESS of a penalty than wow, even claiming WoW doesnt have the option for any class in the game to res you, something is wrong.
So today's "It's cool to hate SWTOR thread" comes up with the fact that the game sucks because it doesn't have the death penalty of 12 year old EQ1 which the majority of MMO gamers don't want anyway? Oh please...
Even EQ1 doesn't have that penalty anymore, since your corpse ends up in Shadowrest instead of disappearing completely.
Will people stop over-reacting. This is not a hate thread. At no point have I said I hate this game, and I'm not going to play it. It's just something missing from the game that I wanted to discuss.
What do you call it when you stretch the truth to imply something that is untrue?
If you wanted to discuss mickey mouse death penalties in modern MMOs, id agree 100%. The moment you start trying to imply SWTOR somehow has LESS of a penalty than wow, even claiming WoW doesnt have the option for any class in the game to res you, something is wrong.
What? I'm not the one stretching the truth.
I have never said that you could not res in WoW, I said that in this game ANYONE can res. Not that nobody in WoW can.
I doubt many people here would agree with you that the death penalty in this game is equal to WoW, and WoW was easy. I've pointed out around 4 things that WoW had that this game does not, that you have either ignored or disagreed with (which is personal opinion, not fact).
The fact that you actually compared EvE as being less death punishment than SWTOR shows how deluded you are. That isn't even stretching the truth, it's running away from it.
Originally posted by Stormwave1 Originally posted by Vonatar So today's "It's cool to hate SWTOR thread" comes up with the fact that the game sucks because it doesn't have the death penalty of 12 year old EQ1 which the majority of MMO gamers don't want anyway? Oh please... Even EQ1 doesn't have that penalty anymore, since your corpse ends up in Shadowrest instead of disappearing completely.
Will people stop over-reacting. This is not a hate thread. At no point have I said I hate this game, and I'm not going to play it. It's just something missing from the game that I wanted to discuss.
Well, it's only missing if it was supposed to be there in the first place.
Bioware wanted players concerned with the character story arcs, not how much XP they had (or lost). They wanted players spending time out in the world doing quests, not running back to camp because they had to repair again to avoid having broken gear. The game's design and intent are counter to having a harsh death penalty. It's not missing because it was never supposed to be there in the first place.
It may feel like it's missing if what you wanted was a harsh death penalty, but if what you wanted was a harsh death penalty, this isn't the game you'd be playing, so you shouldn't be missing it in the first place.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
So today's "It's cool to hate SWTOR thread" comes up with the fact that the game sucks because it doesn't have the death penalty of 12 year old EQ1 which the majority of MMO gamers don't want anyway? Oh please...
Even EQ1 doesn't have that penalty anymore, since your corpse ends up in Shadowrest instead of disappearing completely.
Will people stop over-reacting. This is not a hate thread. At no point have I said I hate this game, and I'm not going to play it. It's just something missing from the game that I wanted to discuss.
Maybe you should have read some info in the run up to release in which BW explained how there used to be no medical droid and you would have to respawn at the nearest med centre and run back (a la WoW). But they changed it because they wanted people to be able to die without getting frustrated and they thought that, especially later in the game, the run time from the med centre back to where you died took to much time. I can't recall now if beta tester feedback was also part of that decision, but likely so.
A design decision that perhaps you don't agree with, but in my view one that was made for the right reasons. The days of harsh death penalties ended with WoW's release (even EQ2 dumbed theirs down soon after release) and in today's MMO market they're not coming back. Devs want people to have fun 99% of the time they're playing - a view that is motivated by profit. Blame the mass market appeal that MMOs now have, meaning they're no longer made for the niche gamer who wants a challenge, because that discourage the much larger bracket of casual gamer consumers.
Comments
It's a custom death penalty.
1.) Easy - Res at your corpse on a timer and try again, take durability.
2.) Medium - Res at the graveyard, take durability, run back and try again.
3.) Hard - Delete your own gear, res at graveyard.
4.) Hardcore - Punch your computer, go to hospital, buy new computer.
It's all about user preference bro, quit crying.
What's the benefit to the film director in making a movie that fewer people will like? Why shouldn't they make a movie that more people will like and that more people will pay for?
--------------------
Quoting your edit: "Also, I don't disagree that developers want to create great games. It's just that 'great' is subjective and depends on what someone likes. You can create a great game without a death penalty. All other things being equal, more people will buy the game that does not have the harsh death penalty."
My reply to that is: sure you can create a great game without a death penalty. However, the current problem with MMORPGs is that developers copy too much and put too little of their own mark on the game. The amount of variation from MMORPG to MMORPG within the AAA market is simply too small, the single player RPG "AAA" market has far more variation.
You believe that a less people would buy the game if it does not have a harsh death penalty; however, that is far from being proven. A correct balance between punishment and reward may very well be what is needed to keep more people interested and the current low death penalties may be too low to be optimal.
What I do know is that Demon Souls would not be nearly as entertaining without the severe death penalty even under the condition that all other things are equal,
Money? who wouldn't want to have it. Even these artsy directors sooner or later makes movies that appeal to broader audience.
You must not lose faith in humanity. Humanity is an ocean; if a few drops of the ocean are dirty, the ocean does not become dirty -- Mahatma Gandhi
No, some of the greatest "artsy directors" stayed true to their art throughout their whole careers. Two fine examples: Ingmar Bergman and Federico Fellini.
Stanley Kubrick or Michael Bay, I wonder who is the most highly regarded director and who aspiring directors would like to become if they had to choose.
I think it's obviously a personal opinion and I could really take it or leave it. I've played games with harsh dp and games with none and it never really changed how I played the game, who I grouped with or anything else.
What did change it for me was full loot drop on death... man... that REALLY made you want to not get killed. The XP hit didn't really bother me. You got it all back, or most of it on the corpse run, but in shadowbane, loosing all my money and runes pissed me off to no end. Made it more fun.
Stretch the actuals much? You have much more of a chance of dieing twice in an hour while leveling than the chance of not being able to find a safe spot to rez in the MASSIVE radious around your corpse in WoW (not to mention that you respawn with an even smaller fraction of health in SWTOR).
Matter of fact, I have died more than twice in an hour trying to take on multiple elites (by mistake), yet I literally cannot remember a time in my 4 years of WoW playing where i was not able to res safely away from danger...
Your "anyone can res you" is a moot point, the same limitations/Pros apply to WoW: You need to be near someone who can kill whatever killed you, plus anyone in wow can res you as well (3/4ths of wow classes have a rez, plus guild res can be used by any class in the game), so you obviously have not played since Cata's release. Again, this post should have been about the lax death penalties in modern MMOs in general, not the "lack of penalty in SWTOR".
As others have pointed out, this has been a common issue in almost every MMO released in the last 7 years....to try to imply that SWTOR some how "went further" is either a huge stretch of the truth to push an anti TOR agenta, or just plain trolling.
I disagree...
Every opponent of harsher death penalties will always argue that they do nothing but make you spend more time, and don't really change gameplay at all. This is just so wrong.
I encourage all of you guys to play Dark Souls, Minecraft, or Terraria.
All of those games have severe death penalties and it DRASTICALLY changes the way the game is played. In Minecraft, if you die you drop all your stuff on your person and may very well lose it. Believe me, this makes you EXTRA CAUTIOUS when you are digging down to make sure you don't fall in lava, or digging up to make sure you don't flood your tunnel.
And in Dark Souls, if you die you lose all of your current "souls" (spendable exp) and have to start back at a checkpoint that can be far away. Believe me...it makes you think critically about each fight you engage. Instead of just running in blindly and hoping to win, you will always tactically assess the situation beforehand and try to figure out the best way to handle it. You're always EXTREMELY cautious when traveling to a new area because you never know what kind of nasty surprises await you.
The death penalty in these games define the play experience. Without it, I wouldn't care about digging into lava in Minecraft...I would just dig where I want, and if I die? Who cares. And in Dark Souls, I would just run through the levels repeatedly bashing my head against each fight until I win. The element of caution, danger, and planning would be gone from each of these games.
I'm not saying that harsher death penalties are always the best thing, but they DO change the play experience, and they CAN add something meaningful to a game.
The "death penalties just make you grind more" argument only works if you assume that the player has absolutely no control over whether or not they die. Because, if this were true, then death would be completely random and essentially just an exp-sink. This is never the case in video games.
Are you team Azeroth, team Tyria, or team Jacob?
So punish yourself when you die. Eat a can of dog food or trash one item your character is wearing. Don't sit around waiting for the devs to do everything for you; get creative.
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Kyleran: "Now there's the real trick, learning to accept and enjoy a game for what it offers rather than pass on what might be a great playing experience because it lacks a few features you prefer."
John Henry Newman: "A man would do nothing if he waited until he could do it so well that no one could find fault."
FreddyNoNose: "A good game needs no defense; a bad game has no defense." "Easily digested content is just as easily forgotten."
LacedOpium: "So the question that begs to be asked is, if you are not interested in the game mechanics that define the MMORPG genre, then why are you playing an MMORPG?"
That would work to a certain extent if it was a single player game. SWTOR is though a co-op game, so unless you make your allies eat the can too, it isn't as effective. Also it significantely breaks immersion, which is bad.
This is the main reason why i cancelled my sub. This game was so easy it was a joke. If something kills you, you just respawn right where you died. No lost xp, no lost items. LOL. I think a trained monkey could solo to the level cap. And no i did not do hard mode instances. Why? Because I play mmorpg's for world pvp. World pvp in SWTOR is meaningless, even worse than WOW.
There was a time when video games were challenging. Now they almost play themselves. Games are supposed to be fun, but for a lot of people, that means challenging. I wouldn't play Hello Kitty Island Adventure because it is designed for kids and is thus way too easy for me to have fun playing.
And no i am not going to manually punish myself when i die. That is the dumbest thing i ever heard. Might as well play DnD or something if i am just going to make up my own rules concerning a game. The entire point of gaming is trying to find tactics and tricks to get around difficult video game content.
But nowadays it seems that Western gamers don't like challenging games. I am very embarrassed about this and very annoyed that it will keep a lot of great japanese games from releasing in the United States. Anyway, played SWTOR for about a week and found it to be super easy with almost no world pvp. Story is nice but it is not a substitute for poor gameplay. Anyway, back to EVE and Dark Souls for me.
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I will play no more MMORPGs until somethign good comes out!
May I please know why you are still playing EVE then? Because as long as you keep your insurance up to date, there is even less of a death penalty than TOR...
It's no secret that most MMO players (fans) will finish out the leveling game, been that way since the start. The longer you make that, and the more you set back those trying to achieve and the more you give them to "achieve", the longer they will play.
They do the same thing today, except instead of grinding numbers, you're grinding for items ( gear) (read: MMO companies learned a thing or two from diablo).
I disagree...
Every opponent of harsher death penalties will always argue that they do nothing but make you spend more time, and don't really change gameplay at all. This is just so wrong.
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I usually argue that death penalties need to match the game that they are currently active in. The death penalty from Minecraft would not make sense in WoW, and the death penalty in WoW would not make sense in Minecraft. This discussion didn't really seem to go in that direction.
But I'm not really an opponent of harsh death penalties...just an opponent of applying to them to every single new game that comes out that doesn't have one.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
I would also oppose applying them to every single new game that comes out that doesn't have one. What I want is variation and currently the AAA scene has too little; stronger death penalty is just one partial step one can go. Hopefully, The Secret World and Guild Wars 2 will change the staleness.
May I please know why you are still playing EVE then? Because as long as you keep your insurance up to date, there is even less of a death penalty than TOR...
Do you have any idea what you're talking about?
Not only in EvE does insurance cost a fortune, you also have to clone or lose skill points if you get capped. Plus you lose your expensive ship and all expensive equipment (unless you're not looted). Plus it will take you a long time to get back to wherever it was, not that anythin would be left. EvE is harsh death penalty.
So today's "It's cool to hate SWTOR thread" comes up with the fact that the game sucks because it doesn't have the death penalty of 12 year old EQ1 which the majority of MMO gamers don't want anyway? Oh please...
Even EQ1 doesn't have that penalty anymore, since your corpse ends up in Shadowrest instead of disappearing completely.
Well the death penalty in this game is too light but then again so are all Themepark MMOs so you are partly right that it is not specific to SW:TOR.
However I would much rather have a harscher death penalty, maybe like a % exp loss, but only in PvE. Seeing as leveling is so quick in this game I would not see that as a big issue.
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Only part I dont agree with is the death is never random part. When you get PvP ganked, in some games, it is usually out of your control and random. Unless you consider being in a PvP enabled area to be something that falls under the players control about dying or not.
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Will people stop over-reacting. This is not a hate thread. At no point have I said I hate this game, and I'm not going to play it. It's just something missing from the game that I wanted to discuss.
You are listing "posibilities" of a death penalty, which is ture, are very harsh, though if you do your stuff right (clone, insurance etc) there is almost no penalty aside from spending time claiming your insurance/clone.
I have a mining barge, have gotten killed twice, lost no skill points, and got my stuff back in less time it has taken me to do past corpse runs in WoW . Granted, if I didnt hanlde my affairs properly, I would have been F'ed.
Yeah...I wouldn't hold your breath if changing the staleness involves any sort of unforgiving game play mechanics.
You might take a look at Salem or Dominus. Salem especially seems to espouse a much less forgiving play style. Salem is very much a sandbox and Dominus looks to be a spiritual successor to Dark Age of Camelot, but in space with space bugs.
** edit **
I had not noticed before now, but Dominus has opened their beta signup page.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
What do you call it when you stretch the truth to imply something that is untrue?
If you wanted to discuss mickey mouse death penalties in modern MMOs, id agree 100%. The moment you start trying to imply SWTOR somehow has LESS of a penalty than wow, even claiming WoW doesnt have the option for any class in the game to res you, something is wrong.
What? I'm not the one stretching the truth.
I have never said that you could not res in WoW, I said that in this game ANYONE can res. Not that nobody in WoW can.
I doubt many people here would agree with you that the death penalty in this game is equal to WoW, and WoW was easy. I've pointed out around 4 things that WoW had that this game does not, that you have either ignored or disagreed with (which is personal opinion, not fact).
The fact that you actually compared EvE as being less death punishment than SWTOR shows how deluded you are. That isn't even stretching the truth, it's running away from it.
Well, it's only missing if it was supposed to be there in the first place.
Bioware wanted players concerned with the character story arcs, not how much XP they had (or lost). They wanted players spending time out in the world doing quests, not running back to camp because they had to repair again to avoid having broken gear. The game's design and intent are counter to having a harsh death penalty. It's not missing because it was never supposed to be there in the first place.
It may feel like it's missing if what you wanted was a harsh death penalty, but if what you wanted was a harsh death penalty, this isn't the game you'd be playing, so you shouldn't be missing it in the first place.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
Maybe you should have read some info in the run up to release in which BW explained how there used to be no medical droid and you would have to respawn at the nearest med centre and run back (a la WoW). But they changed it because they wanted people to be able to die without getting frustrated and they thought that, especially later in the game, the run time from the med centre back to where you died took to much time. I can't recall now if beta tester feedback was also part of that decision, but likely so.
A design decision that perhaps you don't agree with, but in my view one that was made for the right reasons. The days of harsh death penalties ended with WoW's release (even EQ2 dumbed theirs down soon after release) and in today's MMO market they're not coming back. Devs want people to have fun 99% of the time they're playing - a view that is motivated by profit. Blame the mass market appeal that MMOs now have, meaning they're no longer made for the niche gamer who wants a challenge, because that discourage the much larger bracket of casual gamer consumers.