Oh and I shouldnt be able to fight if I sustain too much damage and must rest for weeks at the hospital.
That mechanic actually played out surprisingly well in the old XCOM games (yeah, I know, not an MMO ... but still a source of inspiration). If you have a game designed around playing a stable of alts rather than a single character, then having various timeouts (recuperation, training, crafting) is something to consider.
the reason i like all the things you listed OP (travel time, local markets, food etc etc) is not because they are realistic but because i simply enjoy the depth and complexity they create in a mmorpg. i particularly like local markets. i know diablo 2 isnt a mmorpg but trading and getting awesome deals was heaps fun. i know most people dont here like asian f2p games (i dont either) but perfect world had a pretty awesome catshop system were u could set up a shop anywhere and there was a huge local market thing going there. it felt like you were in a real like bazaar going from stall to stall to look for items and mats.
the reason i like all the things you listed OP (travel time, local markets, food etc etc) is not because they are realistic but because i simply enjoy the depth and complexity they create in a mmorpg. i particularly like local markets. i know diablo 2 isnt a mmorpg but trading and getting awesome deals was heaps fun. i know most people dont here like asian f2p games (i dont either) but perfect world had a pretty awesome catshop system were u could set up a shop anywhere and there was a huge local market thing going there. it felt like you were in a real like bazaar going from stall to stall to look for items and mats.
I want to feel the weight of my character when I move, I don't want to feel forever trapped within a very basic selection of emotes and peculiar stances that don't do very much, to help convey my personality / attitude. I don't want pretty icons with counters to do most of the job for me, I want to have more and more control over my character's actions or I simply won't enjoy playing with them.
What ever... happened to all those little emotions? Why... would I want to kill some enemy? To make points? We don't care anymore, we are almost completely desensitized to many things because they don't mean anything anymore. We are not impressed by the evil nemesis, we laugh carelessly at it's crappiness and respawn in a nearby location, too annoyed to try again.
I envy my little sister that cried everytime LaraCroft was eaten by the wolves. It takes much more for us to barely care about her.
I usually agree with Castille so it seemed weird that she would make such an argument against added realism.
Dont mind me Im just stressed lol
Offtopic :
Hows your game making going Cua?
''/\/\'' Posted using Iphone bunni ( o.o) (")(") **This bunny was cloned from bunnies belonging to Gobla and is part of the Quizzical Fanclub and the The Marvelously Meowhead Fan Club**
I'm not sure realism is what I want. I think it's more like detail.
If I'm playing a mage from the Zimblowme tribe on planet AngaOngo, and I have a ton of complex spells in my spellbook, that's not realism, but rather detailed fantasy. It's the opposite of "dumbed down".
I like detail. If it takes 15 components to make a clock, then it does. I shouldn't be able to make one out of a piece of wood and a bar of copper and it should take longer than 2 seconds to produce.
BTW: Lots of good comments in the thread. Interesting read.
Your post got me to thinking, and your choice of wording is better. I guess I'm not so interested in a more realistic virtual world, because so many things in real life such as long boring travel, working 8-5 and having to eat and drink all the time can't really be considered fun.
It is in in fact more detail that I'm looking for in my virtual worlds, I'd use the word complexity but that always triggers a firestorm of controversy about nothing in MMO's being complex, or if they are then it is unnecessarily so.
I enjoyed how in DAOC depending on the skills that I rolled on my character starting out (and influenced by his class) it impacted my choice of weapons, their effect of various enemies in the world, and even things like my weapons losing durability after being repaired too many times all added to the enjoyement.
More detail can lead to a more realistic game world, but doesn't really have to, it can just add to the activities one can do once they are there.
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
I usually agree with Castille so it seemed weird that she would make such an argument against added realism.
Dont mind me Im just stressed lol
Offtopic :
Hows your game making going Cua?
Well do to certain circumstances I am seriously considering going on the meds because I can barely sit still to work on it or anything else really.
However its going okay. I am currently making experimental strategy games, I don't wanna say RTS because that has baggage associated with it. It is not at all like Starcraft or C&C. I was saying it would be out near christmas but the aforementioned ADD may be pushing it back to January. Its a demoish game showing how free you are to design the game you like. It has some Majesty like hero units, Tilted Mill/Stronghold style city building, WBC3 style RPGish aspects and limited access to standard RTS units with downsides to compensate for the ability to manage them rather than having them follow the AI.
Its structured to allow several styles of gameplay where you can focus on research, economy, hero spam, picking 2 or 3 of the 12 Militant/Magic/Holy orders which all have wildly different gameplay and focuses, or even trying to play it like a traditional RTS albeit with a lot of tower building to compensate for the weaker units or even focusing on leveling your hero with powerful magic. Heros can level economy or magic or combat or leaderships skills. So your hero could have powerful buffs, devastating AOE, long range monster lair smiting, production bonuses and so forth.
There will eventually be a hierarchy system for a later game which will enable playing with a sort of adventuring party.
As usual its quite a case of my reach exceeding my grasp, I don't think small. Kitchen sink forever!
Then I will get on to the actual 7 planned games that I'm modifying the engine for which focus more on particular aspects.
No, the question was "How much realism do you want in your virtual world MMORPGS", do you really think that people will be fooled by you cutting off the end of the title to justify your thread hijacking.
I want it to be as realistic as it could be. That means being forced to eat, sleep, rest, go to the potty, and need to go to the hospital when wounded by a significant amount.
Oh and I shouldnt be able to fight if I sustain too much damage and must rest for weeks at the hospital.
Is this sarcastic?
Naw, just an extensive use of hyperbole, another time proven forum posting tactic here at MMORPG.COM. Although it looks similar, sarcasm is more clever.
I usually agree with Castille so it seemed weird that she would make such an argument against added realism.
Because added realism is not always fun. That should be self-evident. Only an extreme niche will think that we need to model every aspect of the real world to have fun. Most people ESCAPE the real world when they play games.
I only want meta realism where your imagination can fill in the gaps. In reality a city might need 100 farming villages to feed it but you don't need that in the game - but if you have one or some farming villages it's better if they're not completely over-run by low-level monsters being ignored by high level npcs.
In the end these games mostly come down to killing monsters so making killing monsters more interesting makes for a better game. I think part of the desire for worlds is a coincidence to do with that i.e. i think if devs try and imagine a virtual fantasy world *first* and then design the game around that image then that process tends to create a more interesting game world to play in - so you might be doing the same stuff but in a more interesting setting.
If the game world is designed in gamey terms i.e. two starting zones lvl 1-12 connecting to two hub cities connecting to two linear paths comprising a lvl 13-24 zone to a 25-36 zone to a lvl 37-48 zone connecting to a joint two-faction pvp zone with the lore and back story added afterwards it's just much more likely to be dull.
So i think creating 1) creation myth / gods, 2) ancient history, 3) current events, 4) economy in advance, at least in skeletal form with a lot of stubs to fill out over time, is likely to create a more interesting game world as a side-effect as well as providing ideas for content i.e. if you have town with a bunch of surrounding villages each with an economic function e.g. crops, cattle, sheep etc then you have a bunch of starter chore type quests right there. You don't need some grand story for every quest if the quests all tie into the world. Save the dramatic stories for later - early on just go find a lost pig.
The second thing is i get bored if it's just monster-killing. I like to have other things to do from time to time. Crafting is the obvious thing but i think virtual worlds make it easier to imagine other non-fighting activities that tie into the lore.
What i'd specifically like to see
###
1) Seasons, say one real week to a game month so a game year in 12 weeks. This would be the simplest way to create the illusion of a dynamic world especially if some quests, mobs, dungeons etc varied with the seasons.
2) Festivals, but related to the game world not related to earth time or earth festivals. This could tie in very well with non-fighting or at least non-levelling activities e.g. the wood elf festival might include an archery mini-game which takes a bit of practise but once completed gives the character a 2% archery damage bonus for the following game year, a hobbit festival might have a pony racing minigame which if you complete gives a 5% mount speed bonus for the following game year. Eventually you could have a spring, summer, autum, winter festival at each settlement with all kinds of non-levelling activities that suited the race involved.
3) Earned fast travel - not much fast travel at level one but various different ways as you level up accessed by quests or simply having more money e.g. a teleporting wizard guild which charges a lot by newbie standards but a reasonable amount once you're higher level. This way you still get the epic feel of a qeynos-freeport run at level 1 but at level 50 when you want to get to a raid you can get there fast. Also more interesting fast travel options than just moving faster e.g. short-cuts through dangerous areas that you can quest for and some you can do from level one if you simply learn about them, or by class e.g. rogue characters having short-cuts over city rooftops only they can use.
4) Fatigue, connected to the food/drink idea, the longer you are away from a settlement and the more fighting you do the more fatigue you pick up which acts as a debuff eventually which you can only permanently clear in a tavern or a temple. In the field you can clear the effects temporarily with things like food / drink / abilities / spells / ranger campsites etc but eventually you need to go back to town.
5) Night / Day cyle, shorter but stronger i.e. make the night part a shorter percentage of the total e.g. ten minutes per hour, but make it more dynamic i.e. night is much darker and different and often more dangerous mobs spawn at night. This and seasons would be an easy way to make worlds feel more dynamic. As well as being more scary if NPCs deactivated at night as well this would be the best time to get rid of fatigue also.
I never thought a gameworld being a "virtual world" had anything at all to do with gameplay elements. IMO, a virtual world is a gameworld that feels and looks alive. If I'm constantly stopping to take screenshots or just take in the sights and sounds, that's usually indicative of being in a virtual world. That's how I interpret it at least.
To be honest, from what I have read so far, it seems that people are looking for detail in an MMO, rather than realism.
A simple comparison would be the whole Buckler vs. Shield thing in WoW. Bucklers are too small to be used like a normal shield, but were often used to deflect melee weapons, or even be used as a weapon, while more traditional shields were very bulky and were more commonly used for missile deflection (arrows, not nukes btw). However, homogenization of details results in these two weapons effectively being fused into a one-size-fits-all item.
I want it to be as realistic as it could be. That means being forced to eat, sleep, rest, go to the potty, and need to go to the hospital when wounded by a significant amount.
Oh and I shouldnt be able to fight if I sustain too much damage and must rest for weeks at the hospital.
Is this sarcastic?
Naw, just an extensive use of hyperbole, another time proven forum posting tactic here at MMORPG.COM. Although it looks similar, sarcasm is more clever.
I usually agree with Castille so it seemed weird that she would make such an argument against added realism.
Because added realism is not always fun. That should be self-evident. Only an extreme niche will think that we need to model every aspect of the real world to have fun. Most people ESCAPE the real world when they play games.
The question wasn't about fun. It was about virtual world which may not be the same thing as mmorpG. G = game = fun.
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?"
Id like to see more games with larger variety of animals that interact with each other and us the gamers.
I remember in SWG (yes i know its a dead game), but one of the features i realy thought was cool was the creatures that were agressive (rancor, krayts, etc) would often times attack non-aggressive creatures around its lair.
To me that was very realistic 9not the creature part but the behavior), and would like to see more of the same in future mmo's.
Id like to see more games with larger variety of animals that interact with each other and us the gamers.
I remember in SWG (yes i know its a dead game), but one of the features i realy thought was cool was the creatures that were agressive (rancor, krayts, etc) would often times attack non-aggressive creatures around its lair.
To me that was very realistic 9not the creature part but the behavior), and would like to see more of the same in future mmo's.
One thing that struck me about realism when thinking about this topic:
In reality, even the smallest gun with a direct hit to the thigh is likely to drop the target to the ground writhing in pain.
I've seen videos of shooter games where it took 20+ shots to the head before the target dropped.
I'm not sure how I feel about this.
Ken Fisher - Semi retired old fart Network Administrator, now working in Network Security. I don't Forum PVP. If you feel I've attacked you, it was probably by accident. When I don't understand, I ask. Such is not intended as criticism.
We see a lot of threads and posts decrying the loss of "virtual worlds" and I'm certainly one of the guilty parties in this regards, but I got to thinking, just what makes a MMORPG more realistic yet at the same time remain fun?
Unrealistic PVP (i.e. no consequence, instant respawn, dive right back in to fight some more). Rambo-movie level of unrealistic, else video-game pvp just doesn't work.
Pretty much required for PVP at all, isn't it? Even the games that brag about the 'realism' of their pvp don't have posses of citizens chasing them everywhere (bounty systems at least begin to approach the problem, I guess).
We won't even begin to catalog the thousands of ways PVE departs from "realism" in the name of fun.
^ This
Do people here remember the movie Excalibur? It was lambased for having boring fight scenes. John Boorman went for the realistic route, and did his research to back it up. He showed us how a fight really would be like with 40lbs of plate armor strapped to someone's body and a claymore weighing up to 7 lbs in their hand. Sorry, but you're just not doing backflips and multi-attack hits with that kind of gear. You're not doing those kind of moves with leather gear either. Visit any Renaissance Fair and ask one of the wandering rogues how heavy leather gear can be.
I'll tell you what. Let's get a game designer to build us a PvP game that operates on real-world principles and physics. You swing your sword...maybe hit something...and then rest until you can gather enough strength to do it again 45 seconds later. Two or three minutes for each fight and no one wins because both parties are too damn tired to continue.
Oh and when you're injured and can't fight any longer? You lay right where you are until someone can drag you away and tend to your wounds until you are ready to fight again. Let's say 72 hours later...or possibly days...or weeks.
Let's not forget that when you're dead, you're dead. The end. No rez for you.
I'll take unrealistic gameplay any day, thank you.
This is less than what modern infantry carries. Its a common misconception to think that knights and heavy infantry were slow, this is of course if we are talking about battelfields. In arenas they made the armor extra thick and heavy.
So while you cant do backflips and the like you were far from slow, in fact it was quite easy to run. The same way infantry nowdays can run with all the equipment they carry. You just need to train your body accordingly.
This is basically the mob equivalent of economy. It doesn't have to be fully detailed, just have the basic food chain in place e.g. prey animal and predator. The game could have various points marked as feeding spots for the prey animals and they move to a spot, stay a while and then randomly pick the next spot to move to. The predator animal moves around randomly and if it gets close enough to the prey animal it attacks. Predator critters don't attack you straight away if you're not their primary food but will unless you move out of range. Omnivores like bears move around a different set of food sources - make them the same as player gathering nodes for fun - and don't attack straight away either but are majorly dangerous for a long time.
A similar system could be used to make intelligent mobs offer a variable challenge e.g. a goblin cave has a bunch of guard posts around it in a perimeter containing a linked group of 4-6 goblins with armor and heavy weapons that need a strong group or out-levelling. At the same time groups of 2-4 lighter armed hunters spawn at the cave and move to one of the prey animals feeding spots and wait for a while in ambush (which players might stumble on) until a prey animal comes. After they get one they head back to the cave system. Lastly groups of 1-2 lightly armed foragers spawn at the cave entrance and move to a randomly selected gathering food source, stay for a while, then move to 2-3 more before heading back. The goblins could all be similar level but provide different opportunities for multiple levels of players and groups. Most critters despawn at night and then reset the next morning.
I think this is a good example of how the same thing - killing mobs - can be made more interesting without the code being that complicated.
7) Class based levelling
Instead of simply killing the same mobs to level make it so classes level differently e.g. fighters get good exp for killing mobs, rogues get 1/2 exp for killing mobs but double exp for completing missions, rangers get 1/2 exp for killing mobs but double exp for exploring, wizards don't get exp for killing mobs at all they get it from earning lore points which they get from books, scrolls, visiting shrines, teachers etc (and killing mobs until they trigger the one time lore points for that mob) etc. The lore would be broken into categories so necromancers might get 1/2 lore points for most categories but quadruple points for necromantic lore. Priests the same as wizards but focused on holy lore. Fighters would also get exp from lore points earned by players they were grouped with to encourage them to escort casters. Wizards wouldn't get spells given to them when they levelled but would get them as drops from appropriate mobs e.g. a fire spell off a fire-using creature, invisibility off of magical stealth backstabby type mobs, necromancers would learn a summon skeleton spell from fighting skeletons, summon zombie from fighting zombies etc.
8) No level 38 badgers.
I like it if mobs stay at a realistic level of danger the whole game i.e. a goblin is mostly always a goblin rather than level 4 goblins in one zone and level 40 in another. Given limits on number of models etc this would work best if the combat system has different ways of making mobs dangerous other than level. I'd also like it if different levels of player could play in a group and still be useful, including pvp and i'd like mobs to be more realistic also in the sense of there usually being a boss and lots of minions and for lots of low-level to still be potentially dangerous to a single high level.
So for example if goblins were fixrd to be level 4-12 throughout still being able to make goblins a challenge from level 1-30 for players - or even 1-50 if there were enough of them e.g. a dungeon tunnel where the players could be swamped if they didn't get through it fast enough.
The sort of changes you need for that are things like
- stamina e.g. HP is low and goes up slowly while stamina goes up like normally hp does in standard games, every hit reduces stamina before you check for parry, block or dodge and then finally check armor to see if there is any HP damage as well, with running out of stamina giving a major penalty, so swarms of rats can still take down a high level if there's hundreds
- mob taunt - mob crowd control, tactics and other special mob abilities
- bonuses to hit for each attacker e.g. 2 attackers both get +1, 3 attackers all get +2, 4 attackers all get +3 etc. Similarly a higher level player fighting a boss (or another higher level player) gets a bonus from a low level player attacking also.
9) Mixed level content in zones
Roaming mobs close to guarded settlement should mostly be low-level but even then you could still have a haunted tower on a hill with higher level mobs. Elsewhere zones hould have a mixture of mob levels (as long as it makes sense) so players in a zone are a mixture also. This avoids the deserted zone feeling in older games and also if the combat is changed if a higher level can't quite beat a mob they can ask some of the lowbies to come help.
Id like to see more games with larger variety of animals that interact with each other and us the gamers.
I remember in SWG (yes i know its a dead game), but one of the features i realy thought was cool was the creatures that were agressive (rancor, krayts, etc) would often times attack non-aggressive creatures around its lair.
To me that was very realistic 9not the creature part but the behavior), and would like to see more of the same in future mmo's.
I thought it was cool that the faction NPCs did this as well... you'd be rolling along and find Imperial NPCs fighting rebel ones in some random place and could jump in on either side,
Plus, the old "NPC faction" system was great too, where if you killed one type of NPCs, Binyan Pirates or whatever, you gained or lost reputation with other NPC factions, Nym Pirates, for instance, and then those different NPCs would aid or fight you as well.
It went a long way to making original (and not the NGE garbage) SWG such a great living game world, despite the many flaws. And it was those smaller, more subtle game mechanics that really went a long way in doing that.
I want it to be as realistic as it could be. That means being forced to eat, sleep, rest, go to the potty, and need to go to the hospital when wounded by a significant amount.
Oh and I shouldnt be able to fight if I sustain too much damage and must rest for weeks at the hospital.
Is this sarcastic?
Naw, just an extensive use of hyperbole, another time proven forum posting tactic here at MMORPG.COM. Although it looks similar, sarcasm is more clever.
I usually agree with Castille so it seemed weird that she would make such an argument against added realism.
Because added realism is not always fun. That should be self-evident. Only an extreme niche will think that we need to model every aspect of the real world to have fun. Most people ESCAPE the real world when they play games.
The question wasn't about fun. It was about virtual world which may not be the same thing as mmorpG. G = game = fun.
If a virtual world in a MMORP GAME .. is not for fun, what is it for? Education?
If you want to build a world simulation for education, i am all for making it as real as possible, down to realistic traffic jams (to learn about traffic policies), and what-not.
But if the virtual world is in a game .. and the topic ask "how much realism do YOU want" .. then my answer is .. not much .. not impeding fun.
Like SKYRIM has a virtual world. It would be horrible if they took away instance teleport and have to trek back and forth to quest objectives in the same terrain again and again. It will be horirble if they take away the ability to wait a number of game hours, so people have to wait in real time for a store to open.
This is less than what modern infantry carries. Its a common misconception to think that knights and heavy infantry were slow, this is of course if we are talking about battelfields. In arenas they made the armor extra thick and heavy.
So while you cant do backflips and the like you were far from slow, in fact it was quite easy to run. The same way infantry nowdays can run with all the equipment they carry. You just need to train your body accordingly.
Can you actually back any of this up? Run for how long?
Another point .. real world battle is 99% logistic and maneuvering, and 1% actually fighting. In the ancient knight and cavalry time, armies marched for DAYS before fighting for hours.
Do you want a game that requires you to play 99% marching in a straight line and complains about bad food?
Oh, many of the soldiers also die from DISEASES, not combat. Do you want to play a soldier coming down with something and lie in bed moaning for hours?
I want it to be as realistic as it could be. That means being forced to eat, sleep, rest, go to the potty, and need to go to the hospital when wounded by a significant amount.
Oh and I shouldnt be able to fight if I sustain too much damage and must rest for weeks at the hospital.
Is this sarcastic?
Naw, just an extensive use of hyperbole, another time proven forum posting tactic here at MMORPG.COM. Although it looks similar, sarcasm is more clever.
I usually agree with Castille so it seemed weird that she would make such an argument against added realism.
Because added realism is not always fun. That should be self-evident. Only an extreme niche will think that we need to model every aspect of the real world to have fun. Most people ESCAPE the real world when they play games.
The question wasn't about fun. It was about virtual world which may not be the same thing as mmorpG. G = game = fun.
If a virtual world in a MMORP GAME .. is not for fun, what is it for? Education?
If you want to build a world simulation for education, i am all for making it as real as possible, down to realistic traffic jams (to learn about traffic policies), and what-not.
But if the virtual world is in a game .. and the topic ask "how much realism do YOU want" .. then my answer is .. not much .. not impeding fun.
Like SKYRIM has a virtual world. It would be horrible if they took away instance teleport and have to trek back and forth to quest objectives in the same terrain again and again. It will be horirble if they take away the ability to wait a number of game hours, so people have to wait in real time for a store to open.
I wouldn't necessarily be horrible if there was something to do, or if something happened differently enough every time you made the journey.
I actually was thinking about trying Skyrim again the other day, (I burned out on it rather quickly my first go around) and was considering not using the fast travel option, because it just seemed so "lobby like" and unrealistic when I kept blnking around the world.
Even waiting for a store to open might not be bad, if there was tavern nearby with worthwhile activities going on while I waited. (or slept even)
I realize these concepts don't appeal to you (or many others I suppose) but they do to me and I may go back and try the game with a different bent just see what it would be like.
Heh, maybe I'll do a permadeath try, see how far I go and how differently I'll play the game if dying once means self killing my character. Wonder how far I could really get?
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
Originally posted by Kyleran We see a lot of threads and posts decrying the loss of "virtual worlds" and I'm certainly one of the guilty parties in this regards, but I got to thinking, just what makes a MMORPG more realistic yet at the same time remain fun?
For example, I favor mechanics such as local markets as opposed to global ones, but I don't mind having auction houses while others probably prefer players run the stores or trade themselves.
I liked it better when MMORPG's used food/drink to restore health and stamina (and somewhat influence the pacing of the gameplay), but I wouldn't want to have to eat or drink regularly to avoid starving to death as was the case in Xyson. (or Ultima VI for those who remember that one)
Travel times....mixed feelings about this. They sort of work at a strategic level in games like EVE, where you basically have to provide a means for players to intercept each other and have them part of the strategic equation when chosing combat/logistics option.
But that doesn't mean I didn't love Blessed Teleport Scrolls in my first MMORPG Lineage 1 where a player could set up to 30 waypoints in the game and use these scrolls to instantly teleport to them. (You had to walk to the area the first time to expose the map however).
They weren't free, in fact, a fair share of every players game income/time was spent either farming or buying BTS's. I got rich selling them as I farmed them with my Bugbear Mage in the ant caves.
And lets face it, I would not care for a MMORPG that made my avatar have to "relieve" himself on a regular basis, sometimes there's just such a thing as too much realism.
So that's the question, what sorts of mechanics do you prefer that makes one MMORPG more of a virtual world than another?
Didn't i just answer this last week?. Real for the setting.
However generally i like: Photo-realism (as much as can be expected) No fast travel. Eat, drink and sleep to survive. local Markets. Goods Transport/thief. Have to craft weapons and ammo Thievery/Crime
Do not like perma death tho, That's where i draw the line.
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Comments
That mechanic actually played out surprisingly well in the old XCOM games (yeah, I know, not an MMO ... but still a source of inspiration). If you have a game designed around playing a stable of alts rather than a single character, then having various timeouts (recuperation, training, crafting) is something to consider.
Realism may sound too drastic to some, I don't know if realism is the best word to describe what I want.
Cinematic quality / Believability / Immersion
(yes, I know what happened to that project)
I want to feel the weight of my character when I move, I don't want to feel forever trapped within a very basic selection of emotes and peculiar stances that don't do very much, to help convey my personality / attitude. I don't want pretty icons with counters to do most of the job for me, I want to have more and more control over my character's actions or I simply won't enjoy playing with them.
What ever... happened to all those little emotions? Why... would I want to kill some enemy? To make points? We don't care anymore, we are almost completely desensitized to many things because they don't mean anything anymore. We are not impressed by the evil nemesis, we laugh carelessly at it's crappiness and respawn in a nearby location, too annoyed to try again.
I envy my little sister that cried everytime LaraCroft was eaten by the wolves. It takes much more for us to barely care about her.
Dont mind me Im just stressed lol
Offtopic :
Hows your game making going Cua?
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Your post got me to thinking, and your choice of wording is better. I guess I'm not so interested in a more realistic virtual world, because so many things in real life such as long boring travel, working 8-5 and having to eat and drink all the time can't really be considered fun.
It is in in fact more detail that I'm looking for in my virtual worlds, I'd use the word complexity but that always triggers a firestorm of controversy about nothing in MMO's being complex, or if they are then it is unnecessarily so.
I enjoyed how in DAOC depending on the skills that I rolled on my character starting out (and influenced by his class) it impacted my choice of weapons, their effect of various enemies in the world, and even things like my weapons losing durability after being repaired too many times all added to the enjoyement.
More detail can lead to a more realistic game world, but doesn't really have to, it can just add to the activities one can do once they are there.
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
"I need to finish" - Christian Wolff: The Accountant
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
Well do to certain circumstances I am seriously considering going on the meds because I can barely sit still to work on it or anything else really.
However its going okay. I am currently making experimental strategy games, I don't wanna say RTS because that has baggage associated with it. It is not at all like Starcraft or C&C. I was saying it would be out near christmas but the aforementioned ADD may be pushing it back to January. Its a demoish game showing how free you are to design the game you like. It has some Majesty like hero units, Tilted Mill/Stronghold style city building, WBC3 style RPGish aspects and limited access to standard RTS units with downsides to compensate for the ability to manage them rather than having them follow the AI.
Its structured to allow several styles of gameplay where you can focus on research, economy, hero spam, picking 2 or 3 of the 12 Militant/Magic/Holy orders which all have wildly different gameplay and focuses, or even trying to play it like a traditional RTS albeit with a lot of tower building to compensate for the weaker units or even focusing on leveling your hero with powerful magic. Heros can level economy or magic or combat or leaderships skills. So your hero could have powerful buffs, devastating AOE, long range monster lair smiting, production bonuses and so forth.
There will eventually be a hierarchy system for a later game which will enable playing with a sort of adventuring party.
As usual its quite a case of my reach exceeding my grasp, I don't think small. Kitchen sink forever!
Then I will get on to the actual 7 planned games that I'm modifying the engine for which focus more on particular aspects.
You did reply to my post, didn't you?
Because added realism is not always fun. That should be self-evident. Only an extreme niche will think that we need to model every aspect of the real world to have fun. Most people ESCAPE the real world when they play games.
I only want meta realism where your imagination can fill in the gaps. In reality a city might need 100 farming villages to feed it but you don't need that in the game - but if you have one or some farming villages it's better if they're not completely over-run by low-level monsters being ignored by high level npcs.
In the end these games mostly come down to killing monsters so making killing monsters more interesting makes for a better game. I think part of the desire for worlds is a coincidence to do with that i.e. i think if devs try and imagine a virtual fantasy world *first* and then design the game around that image then that process tends to create a more interesting game world to play in - so you might be doing the same stuff but in a more interesting setting.
If the game world is designed in gamey terms i.e. two starting zones lvl 1-12 connecting to two hub cities connecting to two linear paths comprising a lvl 13-24 zone to a 25-36 zone to a lvl 37-48 zone connecting to a joint two-faction pvp zone with the lore and back story added afterwards it's just much more likely to be dull.
So i think creating 1) creation myth / gods, 2) ancient history, 3) current events, 4) economy in advance, at least in skeletal form with a lot of stubs to fill out over time, is likely to create a more interesting game world as a side-effect as well as providing ideas for content i.e. if you have town with a bunch of surrounding villages each with an economic function e.g. crops, cattle, sheep etc then you have a bunch of starter chore type quests right there. You don't need some grand story for every quest if the quests all tie into the world. Save the dramatic stories for later - early on just go find a lost pig.
The second thing is i get bored if it's just monster-killing. I like to have other things to do from time to time. Crafting is the obvious thing but i think virtual worlds make it easier to imagine other non-fighting activities that tie into the lore.
What i'd specifically like to see
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1) Seasons, say one real week to a game month so a game year in 12 weeks. This would be the simplest way to create the illusion of a dynamic world especially if some quests, mobs, dungeons etc varied with the seasons.
2) Festivals, but related to the game world not related to earth time or earth festivals. This could tie in very well with non-fighting or at least non-levelling activities e.g. the wood elf festival might include an archery mini-game which takes a bit of practise but once completed gives the character a 2% archery damage bonus for the following game year, a hobbit festival might have a pony racing minigame which if you complete gives a 5% mount speed bonus for the following game year. Eventually you could have a spring, summer, autum, winter festival at each settlement with all kinds of non-levelling activities that suited the race involved.
3) Earned fast travel - not much fast travel at level one but various different ways as you level up accessed by quests or simply having more money e.g. a teleporting wizard guild which charges a lot by newbie standards but a reasonable amount once you're higher level. This way you still get the epic feel of a qeynos-freeport run at level 1 but at level 50 when you want to get to a raid you can get there fast. Also more interesting fast travel options than just moving faster e.g. short-cuts through dangerous areas that you can quest for and some you can do from level one if you simply learn about them, or by class e.g. rogue characters having short-cuts over city rooftops only they can use.
4) Fatigue, connected to the food/drink idea, the longer you are away from a settlement and the more fighting you do the more fatigue you pick up which acts as a debuff eventually which you can only permanently clear in a tavern or a temple. In the field you can clear the effects temporarily with things like food / drink / abilities / spells / ranger campsites etc but eventually you need to go back to town.
5) Night / Day cyle, shorter but stronger i.e. make the night part a shorter percentage of the total e.g. ten minutes per hour, but make it more dynamic i.e. night is much darker and different and often more dangerous mobs spawn at night. This and seasons would be an easy way to make worlds feel more dynamic. As well as being more scary if NPCs deactivated at night as well this would be the best time to get rid of fatigue also.
There's lots more of course but that will do.
I never thought a gameworld being a "virtual world" had anything at all to do with gameplay elements. IMO, a virtual world is a gameworld that feels and looks alive. If I'm constantly stopping to take screenshots or just take in the sights and sounds, that's usually indicative of being in a virtual world. That's how I interpret it at least.
To be honest, from what I have read so far, it seems that people are looking for detail in an MMO, rather than realism.
A simple comparison would be the whole Buckler vs. Shield thing in WoW. Bucklers are too small to be used like a normal shield, but were often used to deflect melee weapons, or even be used as a weapon, while more traditional shields were very bulky and were more commonly used for missile deflection (arrows, not nukes btw). However, homogenization of details results in these two weapons effectively being fused into a one-size-fits-all item.
The question wasn't about fun. It was about virtual world which may not be the same thing as mmorpG. G = game = fun.
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Id like to see more games with larger variety of animals that interact with each other and us the gamers.
I remember in SWG (yes i know its a dead game), but one of the features i realy thought was cool was the creatures that were agressive (rancor, krayts, etc) would often times attack non-aggressive creatures around its lair.
To me that was very realistic 9not the creature part but the behavior), and would like to see more of the same in future mmo's.
That's a good one!
One thing that struck me about realism when thinking about this topic:
In reality, even the smallest gun with a direct hit to the thigh is likely to drop the target to the ground writhing in pain.
I've seen videos of shooter games where it took 20+ shots to the head before the target dropped.
I'm not sure how I feel about this.
This is less than what modern infantry carries. Its a common misconception to think that knights and heavy infantry were slow, this is of course if we are talking about battelfields. In arenas they made the armor extra thick and heavy.
So while you cant do backflips and the like you were far from slow, in fact it was quite easy to run. The same way infantry nowdays can run with all the equipment they carry. You just need to train your body accordingly.
6) Ecosystem
This is basically the mob equivalent of economy. It doesn't have to be fully detailed, just have the basic food chain in place e.g. prey animal and predator. The game could have various points marked as feeding spots for the prey animals and they move to a spot, stay a while and then randomly pick the next spot to move to. The predator animal moves around randomly and if it gets close enough to the prey animal it attacks. Predator critters don't attack you straight away if you're not their primary food but will unless you move out of range. Omnivores like bears move around a different set of food sources - make them the same as player gathering nodes for fun - and don't attack straight away either but are majorly dangerous for a long time.
A similar system could be used to make intelligent mobs offer a variable challenge e.g. a goblin cave has a bunch of guard posts around it in a perimeter containing a linked group of 4-6 goblins with armor and heavy weapons that need a strong group or out-levelling. At the same time groups of 2-4 lighter armed hunters spawn at the cave and move to one of the prey animals feeding spots and wait for a while in ambush (which players might stumble on) until a prey animal comes. After they get one they head back to the cave system. Lastly groups of 1-2 lightly armed foragers spawn at the cave entrance and move to a randomly selected gathering food source, stay for a while, then move to 2-3 more before heading back. The goblins could all be similar level but provide different opportunities for multiple levels of players and groups. Most critters despawn at night and then reset the next morning.
I think this is a good example of how the same thing - killing mobs - can be made more interesting without the code being that complicated.
7) Class based levelling
Instead of simply killing the same mobs to level make it so classes level differently e.g. fighters get good exp for killing mobs, rogues get 1/2 exp for killing mobs but double exp for completing missions, rangers get 1/2 exp for killing mobs but double exp for exploring, wizards don't get exp for killing mobs at all they get it from earning lore points which they get from books, scrolls, visiting shrines, teachers etc (and killing mobs until they trigger the one time lore points for that mob) etc. The lore would be broken into categories so necromancers might get 1/2 lore points for most categories but quadruple points for necromantic lore. Priests the same as wizards but focused on holy lore. Fighters would also get exp from lore points earned by players they were grouped with to encourage them to escort casters. Wizards wouldn't get spells given to them when they levelled but would get them as drops from appropriate mobs e.g. a fire spell off a fire-using creature, invisibility off of magical stealth backstabby type mobs, necromancers would learn a summon skeleton spell from fighting skeletons, summon zombie from fighting zombies etc.
8) No level 38 badgers.
I like it if mobs stay at a realistic level of danger the whole game i.e. a goblin is mostly always a goblin rather than level 4 goblins in one zone and level 40 in another. Given limits on number of models etc this would work best if the combat system has different ways of making mobs dangerous other than level. I'd also like it if different levels of player could play in a group and still be useful, including pvp and i'd like mobs to be more realistic also in the sense of there usually being a boss and lots of minions and for lots of low-level to still be potentially dangerous to a single high level.
So for example if goblins were fixrd to be level 4-12 throughout still being able to make goblins a challenge from level 1-30 for players - or even 1-50 if there were enough of them e.g. a dungeon tunnel where the players could be swamped if they didn't get through it fast enough.
The sort of changes you need for that are things like
- stamina e.g. HP is low and goes up slowly while stamina goes up like normally hp does in standard games, every hit reduces stamina before you check for parry, block or dodge and then finally check armor to see if there is any HP damage as well, with running out of stamina giving a major penalty, so swarms of rats can still take down a high level if there's hundreds
- mob taunt - mob crowd control, tactics and other special mob abilities
- bonuses to hit for each attacker e.g. 2 attackers both get +1, 3 attackers all get +2, 4 attackers all get +3 etc. Similarly a higher level player fighting a boss (or another higher level player) gets a bonus from a low level player attacking also.
9) Mixed level content in zones
Roaming mobs close to guarded settlement should mostly be low-level but even then you could still have a haunted tower on a hill with higher level mobs. Elsewhere zones hould have a mixture of mob levels (as long as it makes sense) so players in a zone are a mixture also. This avoids the deserted zone feeling in older games and also if the combat is changed if a higher level can't quite beat a mob they can ask some of the lowbies to come help.
i was sarcastic cuz u said ultra realism. closed account is ultra. What im trying to say realism is different for each player.
english isnt my native lang so since u understand what ive said, are above average
I thought it was cool that the faction NPCs did this as well... you'd be rolling along and find Imperial NPCs fighting rebel ones in some random place and could jump in on either side,
Plus, the old "NPC faction" system was great too, where if you killed one type of NPCs, Binyan Pirates or whatever, you gained or lost reputation with other NPC factions, Nym Pirates, for instance, and then those different NPCs would aid or fight you as well.
It went a long way to making original (and not the NGE garbage) SWG such a great living game world, despite the many flaws. And it was those smaller, more subtle game mechanics that really went a long way in doing that.
If a virtual world in a MMORP GAME .. is not for fun, what is it for? Education?
If you want to build a world simulation for education, i am all for making it as real as possible, down to realistic traffic jams (to learn about traffic policies), and what-not.
But if the virtual world is in a game .. and the topic ask "how much realism do YOU want" .. then my answer is .. not much .. not impeding fun.
Like SKYRIM has a virtual world. It would be horrible if they took away instance teleport and have to trek back and forth to quest objectives in the same terrain again and again. It will be horirble if they take away the ability to wait a number of game hours, so people have to wait in real time for a store to open.
Can you actually back any of this up? Run for how long?
Another point .. real world battle is 99% logistic and maneuvering, and 1% actually fighting. In the ancient knight and cavalry time, armies marched for DAYS before fighting for hours.
Do you want a game that requires you to play 99% marching in a straight line and complains about bad food?
Oh, many of the soldiers also die from DISEASES, not combat. Do you want to play a soldier coming down with something and lie in bed moaning for hours?
Now that is realism, and i want no part in it.
I wouldn't necessarily be horrible if there was something to do, or if something happened differently enough every time you made the journey.
I actually was thinking about trying Skyrim again the other day, (I burned out on it rather quickly my first go around) and was considering not using the fast travel option, because it just seemed so "lobby like" and unrealistic when I kept blnking around the world.
Even waiting for a store to open might not be bad, if there was tavern nearby with worthwhile activities going on while I waited. (or slept even)
I realize these concepts don't appeal to you (or many others I suppose) but they do to me and I may go back and try the game with a different bent just see what it would be like.
Heh, maybe I'll do a permadeath try, see how far I go and how differently I'll play the game if dying once means self killing my character. Wonder how far I could really get?
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
"I need to finish" - Christian Wolff: The Accountant
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
Didn't i just answer this last week?. Real for the setting.
However generally i like:
Photo-realism (as much as can be expected)
No fast travel.
Eat, drink and sleep to survive.
local Markets.
Goods Transport/thief.
Have to craft weapons and ammo
Thievery/Crime
Do not like perma death tho, That's where i draw the line.
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