Remember first playing Asheron's Call and carefully acquiring "death items" that I wouldn't be afraid to lose. I have to admit that it was fun going after my Greater Shadow Armor to craft non drop stuff. It kept me happily occupied for months if not years. AC did keep me on my toes and was a nice introduction to MMOs. I remember some spectacular deaths like the one where my husband tried following some guildmates and jumped into some lava pit. They spent hours trying to help him recover his poor body lol. With that said though, I'm generally not a big fan of overly punitive games. I know there are some players that really enjoy this challenge but it isn't me. I played EQ2 a few years later and admit that corpse runs were not enjoyable for me. There wasn't anything fun about having a death deep in some dungeon with a group, looking at the clock and seeing that it was well past my bed time and I had to go to work the next day and knowing that a corpse recovery wasn't possible. A few of those deaths caused me to leave for WoW and abandon EQ2 right at launch. I did return to EQ2 a bit later after it was toned down a bit and really enjoyed my time there.
Real life for me is stressful enough. I don't enjoy harsh games all that much. Kudos to those who love them though. Ya'll are much better gamers that I am. I do know my limitations though and try to gravitate to games that I know I will enjoy.
Remember first playing Asheron's Call and carefully acquiring "death items" that I wouldn't be afraid to lose. I have to admit that it was fun going after my Greater Shadow Armor to craft non drop stuff. It kept me happily occupied for months if not years. AC did keep me on my toes and was a nice introduction to MMOs. I remember some spectacular deaths like the one where my husband tried following some guildmates and jumped into some lava pit. They spent hours trying to help him recover his poor body lol. With that said though, I'm generally not a big fan of overly punitive games. I know there are some players that really enjoy this challenge but it isn't me. I played EQ2 a few years later and admit that corpse runs were not enjoyable for me. There wasn't anything fun about having a death deep in some dungeon with a group, looking at the clock and seeing that it was well past my bed time and I had to go to work the next day and knowing that a corpse recovery wasn't possible. A few of those deaths caused me to leave for WoW and abandon EQ2 right at launch. I did return to EQ2 a bit later after it was toned down a bit and really enjoyed my time there.
Real life for me is stressful enough. I don't enjoy harsh games all that much. Kudos to those who love them though. Ya'll are much better gamers that I am. I do know my limitations though and try to gravitate to games that I know I will enjoy.
Give 20 constitution points. On death make it a 15% chance of loosing one. When you Get to zero you are dead. Not to harsh and will affect people when they play
Exactly that Jedi was afraid of dying , He knew the end result.... Those players that wait for the zerg are afraid of getting ganked and dying etc ..the funny thing now tho is there is nothing to lose , So why be afraid .. (just such strange behavior).. Embrace it ,welcome it.... you just may surprise yourself and succeed and find it a helluva lot more satisfying than hiding in a corner ... But this confirms my original thought they are afraid (scared) of failing ....
I don't think it's the dying that is important to them in those cases, it's the loss (which equates to time spent)... This is exactly why I went with an easily outfitted build in SWG and ignored the Jedi path, loss meant nothing to me, all I needed was a decent dot gaderffi, a stun baton of some quality (which neither were hard to come buy), as well as med packs and I was good to go. I had no fear of loss, hence I played the game to the fullest.
Most MMORPGs don't handle these penalties very well, that's the main issue with them. Survival games get penalties and danger right IMO. When you're down you don't have a small mountain to climb to get back up again. Survival & risk elements make sense in those games, not how they're handled in MMORPGs, especially the failed niches out there trying to rehash mistakes that were left in the past. They use systems that negate fun and introduce grind, for the sake of grind. Grind as a penalty is bad form and populations show it.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
I think in most cases harsh penalties really do nothing but force most players to avoid actively playing. Which is counter productive IMO. If people are only adventuring when the circumstances negate the possibility of dying, and in turn suffering the consequence. What's the point in having those consequences in the first place?
This is true, but it also has the effect of making things more valuable and exciting. If only a few people have dared to venture to and complete x area then it's something that is talked about in game and those players who did it are admired and sought after for advice. If everyone can do it then there is no excitement there.
I get that it makes a world more foreboding. I don't agree it is the only path to excitement, nor that it's absence equates to no thrill..
I'd say it can be just the opposite in PVP, as the more risked involved in losing, the less people actually PVP outside of zergs, making nail bitingly close even encounters few and far between.
That could also be looked at in a positive light. I find a lot of the PvP in modern games includes respawning quickly and go at it endlessly until time runs out (instance) or in open world PvP it can go on endlessly. I never really enjoyed that aspect of World of Warcraft. I actually prefer the dueling system which may be even more casual in a way. Discouraging PvP from happening all the time might be a good thing. I guess it depends on who is playing the game.
It's also an issue of what type of game, as much as the gamer. A PvP game with nothing but zerg PvP loses it's charm rather fast. A PVE centered game with little PVP wars everywhere, gets rather annoying as well. Different styles work for different games.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
Tried Tibia many years ago. It just creates political issues like who can kill who and what guild your in etc will determine if you live or not. I would only do it if I knew afew people in the game and they were well liked by the community as I can guarantee some kind of protection that way otherwise as a solo random your going to have a hard time.
Tried Tibia many years ago. It just creates political issues like who can kill who and what guild your in etc will determine if you live or not. I would only do it if I knew afew people in the game and they were well liked by the community as I can guarantee some kind of protection that way otherwise as a solo random your going to have a hard time.
Yes and no. It is all about guilds and who you know, but you or anyone in this thread for example are social and community-active people that would easily find friends and protection. But yeah, ofcourse, going in solo to a new game like this can be very hard when most other players play with rl-friends..
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Item destruction is fine , but big no no for experience point or anything that you can't hide away . You must let player to accept the risk , but you must let them have a "chose to not"
Player will not willing to enter the challenge if they can't avoid the big loss . Let them chose how much chips they willing to bet is best chose .
I enjoyed the approach Ultima Online took, having your whole inventory available to be looted upon character death. Of course with a system like that, you need to make items somewhat painless to replace, and depending on the atmosphere you're attempting to foster you may want to make those items replaced by other players/crafters.
I've also been playing a ton of Project Zomboid lately, and while it's not an MMO, it can host up to 64 player servers if I understand the limitations correctly. Their approach is a bit more hardcore, but fits within the atmosphere of simulation the developer is attempting to create, with the player knowing within the first moments of the game that the progress all inevitably leads to your demise (and that's sort of the fun of it). You lose everything when you die in PZ and are forced to create a new character, to retrain skills and reacquire the things you need to survive. The map doesn't reset in single player (and obviously doesn't reset in multiplayer), so while you may lose your character from time to time, you can build a defensive location and store the things you need for when that situation arises.
Really, I like having some kind of loss involved with dying in games. The risk is somewhat exciting, and it makes everything you do have significance or value.
"This is life! We suffer and slave and expire. That's it!" -Bernard Black (Dylan Moran)
I think in most cases harsh penalties really do nothing but force most players to avoid actively playing. Which is counter productive IMO. If people are only adventuring when the circumstances negate the possibility of dying, and in turn suffering the consequence. What's the point in having those consequences in the first place?
This is true, but it also has the effect of making things more valuable and exciting.
Is this true for everyone? If it is true for you are you saying it must be true for everyone? If it is so loved by the players, why aren't devs putting it in every game?
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?"
I think in most cases harsh penalties really do nothing but force most players to avoid actively playing. Which is counter productive IMO. If people are only adventuring when the circumstances negate the possibility of dying, and in turn suffering the consequence. What's the point in having those consequences in the first place?
This is true, but it also has the effect of making things more valuable and exciting.
Is this true for everyone? If it is true for you are you saying it must be true for everyone? If it is so loved by the players, why aren't devs putting it in every game?
That comes back to the current state of games. There are so many games available you can just jump ship to another game if there is some kind of adversity in a game that you face. It's also why early MMOs were great IMO. You couldn't skip the adversity. You had to overcome it or not play MMOs.
In ultima online you could lose items, but those items werent hard to get. A longsword. That it, just longsword. Not longsword of the Heathen Generations of Kramer, just longsword. If you died you just went and bought another. And you did die alot. Sometimes you died because an internet link between you and the server went down 2 states away. Didnt matter if you have a good computer and a good isp. Stuff happens.
@Scorchien ; EQ2 did have a fairly significant penalty if you didn't recover your corpse as I remember well---right at launch. Experience debt that was fairly significant, loss of soulshards that would lower your stats. If you couldn't get back to your corpse, it would be auto recovered after 3 days. Needless to say there was a requirement to trek back to your corpse if there was a death. That was the game mechanic I did not care for and what I was referring to. And frankly why I stopped playing for a bit. Over time, this was changed to being a very minor thing--durability hit if I recall. Obviously many players found the penalty in EQ2 (right at launch) a bit harsh. Oh and there was also a shared experience debt--if one of your group members died, the penalty was shared. Recall being in a troublesome group doing our first dungeon and it was a bloodbath. I came out pretty depressed after our encounter with significant loss to my progress.
Never played EQ and frankly some of the stuff I heard about the death penalties scared me off. Loss of items or levels is a turn off for me. Asheron's Call was the perfect game for my playstyle. Sometimes I do regret not playing EQ in its peak glory days but frankly I'm a bit of a carebear and probably would get frustrated. I know my limitations as a gamer lol.
I think in most cases harsh penalties really do nothing but force most players to avoid actively playing. Which is counter productive IMO. If people are only adventuring when the circumstances negate the possibility of dying, and in turn suffering the consequence. What's the point in having those consequences in the first place?
This is true, but it also has the effect of making things more valuable and exciting.
Is this true for everyone? If it is true for you are you saying it must be true for everyone? If it is so loved by the players, why aren't devs putting it in every game?
That comes back to the current state of games. There are so many games available you can just jump ship to another game if there is some kind of adversity in a game that you face. It's also why early MMOs were great IMO. You couldn't skip the adversity. You had to overcome it or not play MMOs.
IE, unloved designs that had no alternatives. Now that there's choice, those spikey designs are no longer nearly as popular. Got nothing against such games existing, but their devs need to understand the amount of players who will play and support it. And budget appropriately.
I thought those early MMOs weren't worth it, and skipped the entire early genre. Watching my friends play (and curse) was enough to keep me away. Lost revenue. When I found the MMO that really clicked, I stayed (and paid) for over six years.
If you are holding out for the perfect game, the only game you play will be the waiting one.
Punishments are okay, like loss of items and what not. But when you keep losing XP in great amounts it gets frustrating. I can deal with it though if the game is truly fun. As for permadeath, nah... it's not for me. Kind of a shame there isn't a decent game out there for people that crave it though. I know I wouldn't give it any interest unless there was something really unique and great about it. But looking at the gaming trends of the last few years... well nothing is that unique anymore. Can't blame them entirely as Im not exactly coming up with great ideas either lol
Xp loss at death is worthless, it just add some grind and while it is annoying it never been something that makes anyone fear death.
As for item loss, for the majority of all MMOs gaetting cool gear is the main part of the game. Losing all your gear is too much when players spend months getting that gear.
I did like how Linegae at least used to solve the gear loss part though, if you died you might loose a random gear (I think it had to be something equipped, was 15 years ago so I might remember that part wrong), about 1 time in 3 or so that happened. If a wandering monster passed by they picked it up and added it to their loot table. So if you cleared a room where a group had wiped you had a chanse to get a piece or 2 of their gear from the mobs as well as the regular booty.
That was not enough to make players ragequit but still enough to make players fear death. And whatever death penalty you are going for that is what you need to go for, dying should be bad but not a huge disaster forcing you to spend months grinding to replace a single misstake.
Another model is to have the character disabled for certain time unless another player rezz you. Not being able to play for a while is also enough to add exictment without actually destroying the fun. How long time a character should be dead would need some playtesting though, certainly not for more then 24 hours.
No death penalty means players will constantly take stupid risks and silly stuff like when people used dying as a way of travel faster in AoC. Too severe death penalty and you will loose the majority of your playerbase.
The advantage of death penalty if of course that it makes things more exiting. And you do need to consider the risk Vs reward. FFA full loot PvP games tend to miss the last part, when the easiest way to get gear is to gather a bunch of people and gank smaller groups you are making something wrong, it is very little risk for 10 players to kill 4 others and must be rewarded accordingly.
No they're not scared of game content, they simply don't want to waste their time, it's best to wait until the risk is minimal. Where do you think the "forced" socialization factor comes from? It's born of the want to negate the risk.
Dont want to waste there time .. why ... ? They might fail ... ?
Who knows? All I know is I've seen the behavior time and time again. One really good example would be those who played Jedi early on in pre-cu SWG. Most wouldn't go anywhere without an entourage. Another example would be the many players who won't leave a safe spot until they have a zerg behind their back in PVP games. That's the type of crap these harsh games result in. It destroys the fun of playing the game in many cases.
Exactly that Jedi was afraid of dying , He knew the end result.... Those players that wait for the zerg are afraid of getting ganked and dying etc ..the funny thing now tho is there is nothing to lose , So why be afraid .. (just such strange behavior).. Embrace it ,welcome it.... you just may surprise yourself and succeed and find it a helluva lot more satisfying than hiding in a corner ... But this confirms my original thought they are afraid (scared) of failing ....
You lose time. What ever plans you had are now being dictated by someone else. Unless those plans were to PvP.
"We all do the best we can based on life experience, point of view, and our ability to believe in ourselves." - Naropa "We don't see things as they are, we see them as we are." SR Covey
I'm not really all that keen on harsh death penalties anymore. Such penalties seem a rather juvenile way for someone to claim "You died. I'm better than you", when your power goes out for 2 minutes. There's always that guy ready to gloat, even in a PvE setting. Call this a very definitive 'nay' vote.
I'm actually with @nariusseldon on this one. Let the player determine what penalties they want to face, not tailor the entire game experience to the harshest, most brutal extremes and force that on everyone. Such a mechanism, if there is one, shouldn't be able to be changed when a character is running from certain death with 8 HPs left.
Logic, my dear, merely enables one to be wrong with great authority.
Xp loss at death is worthless, it just add some grind and while it is annoying it never been something that makes anyone fear death.
As for item loss, for the majority of all MMOs gaetting cool gear is the main part of the game. Losing all your gear is too much when players spend months getting that gear.
I did like how Linegae at least used to solve the gear loss part though, if you died you might loose a random gear (I think it had to be something equipped, was 15 years ago so I might remember that part wrong), about 1 time in 3 or so that happened. If a wandering monster passed by they picked it up and added it to their loot table. So if you cleared a room where a group had wiped you had a chanse to get a piece or 2 of their gear from the mobs as well as the regular booty.
That was not enough to make players ragequit but still enough to make players fear death. And whatever death penalty you are going for that is what you need to go for, dying should be bad but not a huge disaster forcing you to spend months grinding to replace a single misstake.
Another model is to have the character disabled for certain time unless another player rezz you. Not being able to play for a while is also enough to add exictment without actually destroying the fun. How long time a character should be dead would need some playtesting though, certainly not for more then 24 hours.
No death penalty means players will constantly take stupid risks and silly stuff like when people used dying as a way of travel faster in AoC. Too severe death penalty and you will loose the majority of your playerbase.
The advantage of death penalty if of course that it makes things more exiting. And you do need to consider the risk Vs reward. FFA full loot PvP games tend to miss the last part, when the easiest way to get gear is to gather a bunch of people and gank smaller groups you are making something wrong, it is very little risk for 10 players to kill 4 others and must be rewarded accordingly.
I would have to disagree. XP loss at death can pretty much halt progress and even induce negative progress if a player is not able to perform to a certain level. It and loot loss also do cause fear because when you are about to die there is something at stake. Basically the adrenaline rush will kick in because you really don't want to die. The adrenaline rush never kicks in for most current games because there is nothing to lose. This all goes back to the risk vs reward concept. In games now dying is generally meaningless so there is not much risk. On the flip side there is plenty of rewards as you are constantly being bombarded with new items and quick level ups.
I'm not really all that keen on harsh death penalties anymore. Such penalties seem a rather juvenile way for someone to claim "You died. I'm better than you", when your power goes out for 2 minutes. There's always that guy ready to gloat, even in a PvE setting. Call this a very definitive 'nay' vote.
I'm actually with @nariusseldon on this one. Let the player determine what penalties they want to face, not tailor the entire game experience to the harshest, most brutal extremes and force that on everyone. Such a mechanism, if there is one, shouldn't be able to be changed when a character is running from certain death with 8 HPs left.
I suggested something long ago in a game. At character creation have a slider for death penalty. Where 10 is permadeath and 1 is basically no penalty. Allow players the option to lower it but never raise it. Allow guilds to have a requirement of a specific setting (range) to join. So you can have permadeath guilds. Some still don't like it.
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?"
I would have to disagree. XP loss at death can pretty much halt progress and even induce negative progress if a player is not able to perform to a certain level. It and loot loss also do cause fear because when you are about to die there is something at stake. Basically the adrenaline rush will kick in because you really don't want to die. The adrenaline rush never kicks in for most current games because there is nothing to lose. This all goes back to the risk vs reward concept. In games now dying is generally meaningless so there is not much risk. On the flip side there is plenty of rewards as you are constantly being bombarded with new items and quick level ups.
My experience is that players just choose an easy and safe farming spot to regain that XP. That is at least how it usually went in the older MMOs with XP loss at death. It annoys people but it doesn't scare them, adding boring grind is rarely a solution for anything.
Gear is another matter, players really hate losing gear or gold. But as I said in my post, losing all gear just doesn't work in a game where all endgame progression is done by gear and a single piece of raid gear can take months of hard work.
I do agree that players should fear death but you need the right amount of loss, too little and they wont care and too much and 99% of your players will either ragequit or never try anything even slightly dangerous (which will make them quit due to boredom fast).
Losing 1 part of your equipped gear is bad enough, and actually just having 25-50% chanse of losing it will really make things more exciting then if they loose it 100% of the times. And adding the dropped gear of a failed group to a mobs loot table will make things even more exciting.
I am in agreement that MMOs should have deathpenalties but those deathpenalties should make the game more exciting, not less fun. And frankly can you just have permadeath instead of losing all your gear, in a item based PvE game at least, the endresault is more or less the same, a character who loses all his or her gear is useless anyways and it will takes months to get that character acceptable again.
If all gear have little stat boost and is easy to get you have a different situation but even then constantly being forced to get new gear still will anoy the players, which is one of the reasons games like that so far have done pretty badly.
Such design is a cop-out - and it's artificial challenge. Essentially, you can take any pushover MMO and add severe XP loss upon death, and you'll magically have a "challenging" game.
In that same way, Dark Souls is a challenging game - because your ass is kicked when you fail.
That's not how I would go about creating challenge.
Instead of punishing people because they're not paying attention, make paying attention essential - and make overcoming challenges rewarding.
Essentially, make combat challenging and let death be the result of a lack of skill. But, more than that, make combat exciting and WORTH the investment.
The combination of challenge and an appropriate reward is what will motivate players and keep them motivated.
Why isn't it the norm? Because it's hard to make a great combat system - and it's hard to create content that feels rewarding.
Much, much easier to punish people for not caring about your shit game.
I would have to disagree. XP loss at death can pretty much halt progress and even induce negative progress if a player is not able to perform to a certain level. It and loot loss also do cause fear because when you are about to die there is something at stake. Basically the adrenaline rush will kick in because you really don't want to die. The adrenaline rush never kicks in for most current games because there is nothing to lose. This all goes back to the risk vs reward concept. In games now dying is generally meaningless so there is not much risk. On the flip side there is plenty of rewards as you are constantly being bombarded with new items and quick level ups.
My experience is that players just choose an easy and safe farming spot to regain that XP. That is at least how it usually went in the older MMOs with XP loss at death. It annoys people but it doesn't scare them, adding boring grind is rarely a solution for anything.
Gear is another matter, players really hate losing gear or gold. But as I said in my post, losing all gear just doesn't work in a game where all endgame progression is done by gear and a single piece of raid gear can take months of hard work.
I do agree that players should fear death but you need the right amount of loss, too little and they wont care and too much and 99% of your players will either ragequit or never try anything even slightly dangerous (which will make them quit due to boredom fast).
Losing 1 part of your equipped gear is bad enough, and actually just having 25-50% chanse of losing it will really make things more exciting then if they loose it 100% of the times. And adding the dropped gear of a failed group to a mobs loot table will make things even more exciting.
I am in agreement that MMOs should have deathpenalties but those deathpenalties should make the game more exciting, not less fun. And frankly can you just have permadeath instead of losing all your gear, in a item based PvE game at least, the endresault is more or less the same, a character who loses all his or her gear is useless anyways and it will takes months to get that character acceptable again.
If all gear have little stat boost and is easy to get you have a different situation but even then constantly being forced to get new gear still will anoy the players, which is one of the reasons games like that so far have done pretty badly.
Having played through said games I can say those mechanics do stimulate those types of feelings. It might have less impact in this day and age because people can jump ship to another game easily, but I can say I definitely was fearful of death. I did usually choose a safe spot, but that only makes sense. First you have to find the safe spot. Old games didn't tell you what was safe and what wasn't safe. There was no guide to direct you around to the appropriate content. If you played Dark Souls you should know the feeling. You are playing through extremely cautiously and all of a sudden your panicked and running for your life because you know if you lose you will have to start at the beginning and suffer a penalty (which is not even steep compared to a game like UO or EQ). It is that fear of lose of time and effort that really stimulates emotional outbursts. Depending on what you are looking for in game that might be fun or not.
I don't agree with your reasoning on why those types of games have done badly so far. It is simply because the market is saturated and it's to easy to jump ship to another game. Adversity can be avoided easily as there is no need to overcome it.
Comments
EQ2 never had corpse runs ... EQ ... yes
Most MMORPGs don't handle these penalties very well, that's the main issue with them. Survival games get penalties and danger right IMO. When you're down you don't have a small mountain to climb to get back up again. Survival & risk elements make sense in those games, not how they're handled in MMORPGs, especially the failed niches out there trying to rehash mistakes that were left in the past. They use systems that negate fun and introduce grind, for the sake of grind. Grind as a penalty is bad form and populations show it.
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You must let player to accept the risk , but you must let them have a "chose to not"
Player will not willing to enter the challenge if they can't avoid the big loss . Let them chose how much chips they willing to bet is best chose .
I've also been playing a ton of Project Zomboid lately, and while it's not an MMO, it can host up to 64 player servers if I understand the limitations correctly. Their approach is a bit more hardcore, but fits within the atmosphere of simulation the developer is attempting to create, with the player knowing within the first moments of the game that the progress all inevitably leads to your demise (and that's sort of the fun of it). You lose everything when you die in PZ and are forced to create a new character, to retrain skills and reacquire the things you need to survive. The map doesn't reset in single player (and obviously doesn't reset in multiplayer), so while you may lose your character from time to time, you can build a defensive location and store the things you need for when that situation arises.
Really, I like having some kind of loss involved with dying in games. The risk is somewhat exciting, and it makes everything you do have significance or value.
"This is life! We suffer and slave and expire. That's it!" -Bernard Black (Dylan Moran)
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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?"
Never played EQ and frankly some of the stuff I heard about the death penalties scared me off. Loss of items or levels is a turn off for me. Asheron's Call was the perfect game for my playstyle. Sometimes I do regret not playing EQ in its peak glory days but frankly I'm a bit of a carebear and probably would get frustrated. I know my limitations as a gamer lol.
IE, unloved designs that had no alternatives. Now that there's choice, those spikey designs are no longer nearly as popular. Got nothing against such games existing, but their devs need to understand the amount of players who will play and support it. And budget appropriately.
I thought those early MMOs weren't worth it, and skipped the entire early genre. Watching my friends play (and curse) was enough to keep me away. Lost revenue. When I found the MMO that really clicked, I stayed (and paid) for over six years.
If you are holding out for the perfect game, the only game you play will be the waiting one.
As for item loss, for the majority of all MMOs gaetting cool gear is the main part of the game. Losing all your gear is too much when players spend months getting that gear.
I did like how Linegae at least used to solve the gear loss part though, if you died you might loose a random gear (I think it had to be something equipped, was 15 years ago so I might remember that part wrong), about 1 time in 3 or so that happened. If a wandering monster passed by they picked it up and added it to their loot table. So if you cleared a room where a group had wiped you had a chanse to get a piece or 2 of their gear from the mobs as well as the regular booty.
That was not enough to make players ragequit but still enough to make players fear death. And whatever death penalty you are going for that is what you need to go for, dying should be bad but not a huge disaster forcing you to spend months grinding to replace a single misstake.
Another model is to have the character disabled for certain time unless another player rezz you. Not being able to play for a while is also enough to add exictment without actually destroying the fun. How long time a character should be dead would need some playtesting though, certainly not for more then 24 hours.
No death penalty means players will constantly take stupid risks and silly stuff like when people used dying as a way of travel faster in AoC. Too severe death penalty and you will loose the majority of your playerbase.
The advantage of death penalty if of course that it makes things more exiting. And you do need to consider the risk Vs reward. FFA full loot PvP games tend to miss the last part, when the easiest way to get gear is to gather a bunch of people and gank smaller groups you are making something wrong, it is very little risk for 10 players to kill 4 others and must be rewarded accordingly.
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I'm actually with @nariusseldon on this one. Let the player determine what penalties they want to face, not tailor the entire game experience to the harshest, most brutal extremes and force that on everyone. Such a mechanism, if there is one, shouldn't be able to be changed when a character is running from certain death with 8 HPs left.
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I suggested something long ago in a game. At character creation have a slider for death penalty. Where 10 is permadeath and 1 is basically no penalty. Allow players the option to lower it but never raise it. Allow guilds to have a requirement of a specific setting (range) to join. So you can have permadeath guilds. Some still don't like it.
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Gear is another matter, players really hate losing gear or gold. But as I said in my post, losing all gear just doesn't work in a game where all endgame progression is done by gear and a single piece of raid gear can take months of hard work.
I do agree that players should fear death but you need the right amount of loss, too little and they wont care and too much and 99% of your players will either ragequit or never try anything even slightly dangerous (which will make them quit due to boredom fast).
Losing 1 part of your equipped gear is bad enough, and actually just having 25-50% chanse of losing it will really make things more exciting then if they loose it 100% of the times. And adding the dropped gear of a failed group to a mobs loot table will make things even more exciting.
I am in agreement that MMOs should have deathpenalties but those deathpenalties should make the game more exciting, not less fun. And frankly can you just have permadeath instead of losing all your gear, in a item based PvE game at least, the endresault is more or less the same, a character who loses all his or her gear is useless anyways and it will takes months to get that character acceptable again.
If all gear have little stat boost and is easy to get you have a different situation but even then constantly being forced to get new gear still will anoy the players, which is one of the reasons games like that so far have done pretty badly.
In that same way, Dark Souls is a challenging game - because your ass is kicked when you fail.
That's not how I would go about creating challenge.
Instead of punishing people because they're not paying attention, make paying attention essential - and make overcoming challenges rewarding.
Essentially, make combat challenging and let death be the result of a lack of skill. But, more than that, make combat exciting and WORTH the investment.
The combination of challenge and an appropriate reward is what will motivate players and keep them motivated.
Why isn't it the norm? Because it's hard to make a great combat system - and it's hard to create content that feels rewarding.
Much, much easier to punish people for not caring about your shit game.
I don't agree with your reasoning on why those types of games have done badly so far. It is simply because the market is saturated and it's to easy to jump ship to another game. Adversity can be avoided easily as there is no need to overcome it.