86,3% of mmorpg population would thrash it as garbage cause it is not what they wanted (had not the features they wanted). TBH not all the money or resources in the world could create a game to satisfy this market, its just to diverse.
They all throw their resources/teams/money on ONE huge game together? One to rule them all?
Creating a game world that is so revolutionary, deep and huge it shatters everything else out there in terms of content, features and size?
Creating a game that is so magnificent that it can only rule the planet for the next 20 years?
A game that launches with so much launch content it would take years to even get to some sort of "end game"?
Limitations is that you have one setting of either sci fi or fantasy, and really themepark or sand box, and ofc the type of combat.
Ignoring those limitations, any developer can make a good mmo by
1. Putting horizontal progression that makes end game more diversified other than gear grinding or raiding or pvping. So put mini games such as card games or pvp sport map, and other systems tied to the open world
2. player housing at launch, with trophy system
3. Racing mini game
4. Customization at player creation. Lots of races and lots of choices
5. Customization with gear and keeping shells, and coloring them
6. Progression no longer than 40 hours of story to reach end game
7. Reward alting and rewards are transferable between characters - encourage pvping with different characters so the game can become more of an esport
8. duel arenas, bounty system, tournaments, and gambling
9. day/night cycles
10. NPC movement and NPC faction systems that attack each other and adapt to game world and players
11. Lots of content for end game
12. Quality over quantity, no filler side quests but epic chain quests, dynamic events, puzzles, platforming, bounty contracts etc
I think that should be the foundation for any game that wants to be at least b2p in my mind and p2p... and ofc successful. They avoid those things and they will be hurting.
Write bad things that are done to you in sand, but write the good things that happen to you on a piece of marble
All the ice cream companies should get together and make one perfect ice cream flavor.
There isn't a "right" or "wrong" way to play, if you want to use a screwdriver to put nails into wood, have at it, simply don't complain when the guy next to you with the hammer is doing it much better and easier. - Allein "Graphics are often supplied by Engines that (some) MMORPG's are built in" - Spuffyre
Lol, that would be a total stinker. Now if you could hire the top devs from those and maybe some other companies, give them a huge budget and free hands thing would be very differently but competing companies rarely work well together.
The less the suits have to say about a game and the more the leave to the game developers (who usually game themselves) the better.
They have different mindsets. Blizzard is all about accessibility. CCP wants cohesive gaming world. SOE is in between. Trion is more an F2P dev to me.
The game will = the current market. As in mediocre pieces of everything. It might have accessibility, but it'll be a half game for everyone. Better to have 5 separate games with 5 different focused audiences.
just because aaa devs or studios do something doesnt mean it gets better...quite often smaller studios come up with much more interesting mechanics because they dont have the funding to do "stuff the traditional way" they have to be creative...
look at darkest dungeon for exapmle - very small studio created one of the imo best games of recent years.... so instead of more budget and more aaa i rather want more creativity....
I thought the most interesting thing was the OP's omission of Blizzard from the companies he wanted to involve in this project.
But, such a collaboration would generate a lot of power-struggles, as each tried to put its ideas into play. I would imagine a lot of interesting fodder for discussion, if such information ever became public knowledge.
Logic, my dear, merely enables one to be wrong with great authority.
Blizzard knows this and they are getting on the bandwagon with their latest titles. Folks have spent up to $750 just to get that perfect deck on Hearthstone, that's like more than a consistent four year traditional sub payment and the game literally just came out. NO dungeon, NO raid, NO open world, just a backdrop and some fancy effects on the screen when a card does a critical - low maintenance, high yield $$$.
Not to mention that Hearthstone is fun and convenient.
In fact, if you look at the smaller success (after all, not everyone can have hit games left and right like Blizz), marvel heroes, warframe, world of tanks (although this one is pretty big with more coming) ... they are all "smaller" in scope, with no open world, and more importantly convenient, and fun (to their targeted audience).
I think the age of playing games like second or third jobs and look for serious "achievements" is no longer mainstream. It is all about being able to have fun for 15 minutes at your convenience with very polished gameplay.
Even D3, which is an expensive production .. is going that route. Greater Rifts .. the most challening, end-game content, is framed as 15 min dungeon runs.
When MMO's were designed like this, they weren't mainstream, and never should have been changed to cater to the casuals.
The good news is I think we're about to see a return to those early days, some of these indy dev's will manage to create a small scale hit along the lines of EQ1, DAOC or AC1, and there will be more titles to play for gamers looking to invest more than "15 minutes" into their game play session.
You 15 minute guys don't play golf,. go fishing or any other long term activity either do you?
When MMOs were designed to be a second life, they were not mainstream. The whole MMO industry probably wasn't even close to 1m players. The most successful mmo was EQ wih its measly 400-500k subs at its peak.
Those old school MMOs were not suitable for the people who want play 30 min here and here but they were also not suitable for people who didn't have an insane amount of spare time. Those games were completely unplayable even if you could only do 1-2 hours, especially EQ. I am so happy that games nowadays don't adopt the EQ philosophy. Even the once mighty EQ bowed down to WoW and was wow-ified.
Mission in life: Vanquish all MMORPG.com trolls - especially TESO, WOW and GW2 trolls.
When MMOs were designed to be a second life, they were not mainstream. The whole MMO industry probably wasn't even close to 1m players. The most successful mmo was EQ wih its measly 400-500k subs at its peak.
Those old school MMOs were not suitable for the people who want play 30 min here and here but they were also not suitable for people who didn't have an insane amount of spare time. Those games were completely unplayable even if you could only do 1-2 hours, especially EQ. I am so happy that games nowadays don't adopt the EQ philosophy. Even the once mighty EQ bowed down to WoW and was wow-ified.
As Enbysra stated we are in a MMO dark age and I blame WoW for ushering it in. Don't get me wrong I played it for many years and it was (my opinion) a good game. The industry took a turn for the worst when every company out there tried copying WoW in order to get a piece of the pie.
Nowadays devs are afraid to go back to the old days of MMO design. Some have tried but have kept it still too in line with WoW to really distinguish itself. You don't need WoW level subs in order to be profitable but everyone is trying to hit that and design their game with that in mind and when they fail to achieve it they get shut down or get cut funding to circle the drain while trying to recoup their losses.
The internal politics would be a huge problem. The ego conflicts will be epic.
Who would be the "lead designer" ?
Who would be in charge overall ?
How would the profits be split ?
It reminds me of the old jokes about something being "designed by a committee", i.e. after 8 years of development they'll end up with a MOBA that doesn't have actual combat...
People that have no experience of software projects always fail to realise that simply tripling the manpower and budget does not result in triple the quality and originality. The reverse usually applies. The more people there are working on something, the more meetings their need to be to co-ordinate everyone, and the more managers are needed to keep everything on track.
Pretty much this. At some point of many hundreds of devs it ends up hurting the development. Part of reason why SWTOR launched in it's condition.
Making a game is like making a movie. Even if you have a great idea on paper, hire a great director and the classiest actors, with the clear goal af making a artisticlly great movie, you most likely wont end up making anything but an average movie at best. (Quite a few studios have the formula for bland, generic blockbusters pretty much down, but that is not what we are talking about here. That goes for both games and movies btw...)
If you could really quantify what makes a "good" or even "great" movie or game, we would not see so many bad or just bland ones made.
SOE - Empty promises and marketing, they'll sing you the sweetest songs and then take a dump on your coffee table.
Trion - Really . . . mediocre.
CCP - lol, these guys are morons who are surviving off a niche genre without competition. If EVE had as many games trying to edge it out as let's say . . . the fantasy genre it would buckle. Star Citizen is the first real comer, though it has it's own issues. We do not have dozens upon dozens of space MMO's whereas we get multiple fantasy based MMO's each year.
Funcom - 3 MMOs and has botched each one in one or more critical ways. I wouldn't trust these guys to make a grilled cheese sandwich.
Arenanet - They have what it takes, but they make some really stupid decisions and throw away a lot of potential. GW2 could have been so much more, but somehow they are satisfied with leaving major facets of the game wallowing in blandness.
The internal politics would be a huge problem. The ego conflicts will be epic.
Who would be the "lead designer" ?
Who would be in charge overall ?
How would the profits be split ?
It reminds me of the old jokes about something being "designed by a committee", i.e. after 8 years of development they'll end up with a MOBA that doesn't have actual combat...
People that have no experience of software projects always fail to realise that simply tripling the manpower and budget does not result in triple the quality and originality. The reverse usually applies. The more people there are working on something, the more meetings their need to be to co-ordinate everyone, and the more managers are needed to keep everything on track.
Pretty much this. At some point of many hundreds of devs it ends up hurting the development. Part of reason why SWTOR launched in it's condition.
Actually, what I am seeing here, is a great idea for a new reality TV series or modern day MMORPG. Let's do this!
Hell no. Nobody with any dignity would be part of that. It be be a huge joke. Utlimately making a terrible game to get viewer ratings. Would piss off gamers more than attract them.
I think you would run into a problem with the second rule of Brooke's Law
Communication overheads increase as the number of people increases. Due to combinatorial explosion, the number of different communication channels increases rapidly with the number of people.[3] Everyone working on the same task needs to keep in sync, so as more people are added they spend more time trying to find out what everyone else is doing.
Little forum boys with their polished cyber toys: whine whine, boo-hoo, talk talk.
The internal politics would be a huge problem. The ego conflicts will be epic.
Who would be the "lead designer" ?
Who would be in charge overall ?
How would the profits be split ?
It reminds me of the old jokes about something being "designed by a committee", i.e. after 8 years of development they'll end up with a MOBA that doesn't have actual combat...
People that have no experience of software projects always fail to realise that simply tripling the manpower and budget does not result in triple the quality and originality. The reverse usually applies. The more people there are working on something, the more meetings their need to be to co-ordinate everyone, and the more managers are needed to keep everything on track.
Pretty much this. At some point of many hundreds of devs it ends up hurting the development. Part of reason why SWTOR launched in it's condition.
Actually, what I am seeing here, is a great idea for a new reality TV series or modern day MMORPG. Let's do this!
Hell no. Nobody with any dignity would be part of that. It be be a huge joke. Utlimately making a terrible game to get viewer ratings. Would piss off gamers more than attract them.
Worse, it would do the opposite of what is needed - it would be divisive and try to portray prejudice and drama in the industry. There have been attempts at such a show before, and I think the last one made it only two days into production before the devs told the show producers to take a flying leap.
There isn't a "right" or "wrong" way to play, if you want to use a screwdriver to put nails into wood, have at it, simply don't complain when the guy next to you with the hammer is doing it much better and easier. - Allein "Graphics are often supplied by Engines that (some) MMORPG's are built in" - Spuffyre
When MMOs were designed to be a second life, they were not mainstream. The whole MMO industry probably wasn't even close to 1m players. The most successful mmo was EQ wih its measly 400-500k subs at its peak.
Those old school MMOs were not suitable for the people who want play 30 min here and here but they were also not suitable for people who didn't have an insane amount of spare time. Those games were completely unplayable even if you could only do 1-2 hours, especially EQ. I am so happy that games nowadays don't adopt the EQ philosophy. Even the once mighty EQ bowed down to WoW and was wow-ified.
As Enbysra stated we are in a MMO dark age and I blame WoW for ushering it in. Don't get me wrong I played it for many years and it was (my opinion) a good game. The industry took a turn for the worst when every company out there tried copying WoW in order to get a piece of the pie.
Nowadays devs are afraid to go back to the old days of MMO design. Some have tried but have kept it still too in line with WoW to really distinguish itself. You don't need WoW level subs in order to be profitable but everyone is trying to hit that and design their game with that in mind and when they fail to achieve it they get shut down or get cut funding to circle the drain while trying to recoup their losses.
I honestly do not get the idea behind catering to people with 30 minutes or less to devote to a game. I play games as a time sink. I do not just play them to fill 20 minutes of random activities because I cannot stay focused on one task for any longer. If I only have 30 minutes, and I decide I want to log on the game I use my time for what I can... crafting, bazaar/ah, traveling to where I want to be when I have more time, maybe a couple quick solo mobs, planning what I will do later with friends online, etc.
But when my life comes down to only having a maximum of 30 minutes per sessions... I think I would realize I do not need to play the game it just does not fit my schedule. That or I need to manage my time better so I can put multiple 30 minute sessions together, but time management is not something crazy people who lack an attention span can accomplish.
I guess it would not of been unreasonable for me to expect a game to be designed to cater to my time, when I worked two full time jobs and full time college. There should have been a game that catered to the few minutes I had to sleep, eat, get ready, and play my games because games that only take a few minutes like solitaire or minesweeper don't exist.
Comments
86,3% of mmorpg population would thrash it as garbage cause it is not what they wanted (had not the features they wanted). TBH not all the money or resources in the world could create a game to satisfy this market, its just to diverse.
Limitations is that you have one setting of either sci fi or fantasy, and really themepark or sand box, and ofc the type of combat.
Ignoring those limitations, any developer can make a good mmo by
1. Putting horizontal progression that makes end game more diversified other than gear grinding or raiding or pvping. So put mini games such as card games or pvp sport map, and other systems tied to the open world
2. player housing at launch, with trophy system
3. Racing mini game
4. Customization at player creation. Lots of races and lots of choices
5. Customization with gear and keeping shells, and coloring them
6. Progression no longer than 40 hours of story to reach end game
7. Reward alting and rewards are transferable between characters - encourage pvping with different characters so the game can become more of an esport
8. duel arenas, bounty system, tournaments, and gambling
9. day/night cycles
10. NPC movement and NPC faction systems that attack each other and adapt to game world and players
11. Lots of content for end game
12. Quality over quantity, no filler side quests but epic chain quests, dynamic events, puzzles, platforming, bounty contracts etc
I think that should be the foundation for any game that wants to be at least b2p in my mind and p2p... and ofc successful. They avoid those things and they will be hurting.
Write bad things that are done to you in sand, but write the good things that happen to you on a piece of marble
There isn't a "right" or "wrong" way to play, if you want to use a screwdriver to put nails into wood, have at it, simply don't complain when the guy next to you with the hammer is doing it much better and easier. - Allein
"Graphics are often supplied by Engines that (some) MMORPG's are built in" - Spuffyre
Lol, that would be a total stinker. Now if you could hire the top devs from those and maybe some other companies, give them a huge budget and free hands thing would be very differently but competing companies rarely work well together.
The less the suits have to say about a game and the more the leave to the game developers (who usually game themselves) the better.
All it would be is the most generic game to ever be conceived.
They have different mindsets. Blizzard is all about accessibility. CCP wants cohesive gaming world. SOE is in between. Trion is more an F2P dev to me.
The game will = the current market. As in mediocre pieces of everything. It might have accessibility, but it'll be a half game for everyone. Better to have 5 separate games with 5 different focused audiences.
just because aaa devs or studios do something doesnt mean it gets better...quite often smaller studios come up with much more interesting mechanics because they dont have the funding to do "stuff the traditional way" they have to be creative...
look at darkest dungeon for exapmle - very small studio created one of the imo best games of recent years.... so instead of more budget and more aaa i rather want more creativity....
They should call this mega company TrollcomNETo Online Enterfailment.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I thought the most interesting thing was the OP's omission of Blizzard from the companies he wanted to involve in this project.
But, such a collaboration would generate a lot of power-struggles, as each tried to put its ideas into play. I would imagine a lot of interesting fodder for discussion, if such information ever became public knowledge.
Logic, my dear, merely enables one to be wrong with great authority.
When MMOs were designed to be a second life, they were not mainstream. The whole MMO industry probably wasn't even close to 1m players. The most successful mmo was EQ wih its measly 400-500k subs at its peak.
Those old school MMOs were not suitable for the people who want play 30 min here and here but they were also not suitable for people who didn't have an insane amount of spare time. Those games were completely unplayable even if you could only do 1-2 hours, especially EQ. I am so happy that games nowadays don't adopt the EQ philosophy. Even the once mighty EQ bowed down to WoW and was wow-ified.
Mission in life: Vanquish all MMORPG.com trolls - especially TESO, WOW and GW2 trolls.
As Enbysra stated we are in a MMO dark age and I blame WoW for ushering it in. Don't get me wrong I played it for many years and it was (my opinion) a good game. The industry took a turn for the worst when every company out there tried copying WoW in order to get a piece of the pie.
Nowadays devs are afraid to go back to the old days of MMO design. Some have tried but have kept it still too in line with WoW to really distinguish itself. You don't need WoW level subs in order to be profitable but everyone is trying to hit that and design their game with that in mind and when they fail to achieve it they get shut down or get cut funding to circle the drain while trying to recoup their losses.
Pretty much this. At some point of many hundreds of devs it ends up hurting the development. Part of reason why SWTOR launched in it's condition.
Making a game is like making a movie. Even if you have a great idea on paper, hire a great director and the classiest actors, with the clear goal af making a artisticlly great movie, you most likely wont end up making anything but an average movie at best. (Quite a few studios have the formula for bland, generic blockbusters pretty much down, but that is not what we are talking about here. That goes for both games and movies btw...)
If you could really quantify what makes a "good" or even "great" movie or game, we would not see so many bad or just bland ones made.
SOE - Empty promises and marketing, they'll sing you the sweetest songs and then take a dump on your coffee table.
Trion - Really . . . mediocre.
CCP - lol, these guys are morons who are surviving off a niche genre without competition. If EVE had as many games trying to edge it out as let's say . . . the fantasy genre it would buckle. Star Citizen is the first real comer, though it has it's own issues. We do not have dozens upon dozens of space MMO's whereas we get multiple fantasy based MMO's each year.
Funcom - 3 MMOs and has botched each one in one or more critical ways. I wouldn't trust these guys to make a grilled cheese sandwich.
Arenanet - They have what it takes, but they make some really stupid decisions and throw away a lot of potential. GW2 could have been so much more, but somehow they are satisfied with leaving major facets of the game wallowing in blandness.
Hell no. Nobody with any dignity would be part of that. It be be a huge joke. Utlimately making a terrible game to get viewer ratings. Would piss off gamers more than attract them.
I think you would run into a problem with the second rule of Brooke's Law
Communication overheads increase as the number of people increases. Due to combinatorial explosion, the number of different communication channels increases rapidly with the number of people.[3] Everyone working on the same task needs to keep in sync, so as more people are added they spend more time trying to find out what everyone else is doing.
Little forum boys with their polished cyber toys: whine whine, boo-hoo, talk talk.
Worse, it would do the opposite of what is needed - it would be divisive and try to portray prejudice and drama in the industry. There have been attempts at such a show before, and I think the last one made it only two days into production before the devs told the show producers to take a flying leap.
Here's a decent overview of 'Game Jam':
http://www.polygon.com/2014/3/31/5568362/game-jam-reality-show-maker-studios
There isn't a "right" or "wrong" way to play, if you want to use a screwdriver to put nails into wood, have at it, simply don't complain when the guy next to you with the hammer is doing it much better and easier. - Allein
"Graphics are often supplied by Engines that (some) MMORPG's are built in" - Spuffyre
I honestly do not get the idea behind catering to people with 30 minutes or less to devote to a game. I play games as a time sink. I do not just play them to fill 20 minutes of random activities because I cannot stay focused on one task for any longer. If I only have 30 minutes, and I decide I want to log on the game I use my time for what I can... crafting, bazaar/ah, traveling to where I want to be when I have more time, maybe a couple quick solo mobs, planning what I will do later with friends online, etc.
But when my life comes down to only having a maximum of 30 minutes per sessions... I think I would realize I do not need to play the game it just does not fit my schedule. That or I need to manage my time better so I can put multiple 30 minute sessions together, but time management is not something crazy people who lack an attention span can accomplish.
I guess it would not of been unreasonable for me to expect a game to be designed to cater to my time, when I worked two full time jobs and full time college. There should have been a game that catered to the few minutes I had to sleep, eat, get ready, and play my games because games that only take a few minutes like solitaire or minesweeper don't exist.