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Opposition Podcast mini-summary
Danwarr
Member CommonPosts: 185
Here is a mini-summary of the 2 hour interview of Mark Jacobs by Opposition Podcast
link here: http://www.twitch.tv/oppositionpodcast/c/2169967
This is in no way comprehensive, I just jotted down some things that I found intriguing or important.
Everything in quotes are quotes from Mark.
First Video
:14:30 – Generalized Class Concepts; Rock, Paper, Scissors Class Balance
- No mirrored classes, race, realms
- Classes with be unique between realms:
- Balance: “Ongoing nightmare”, want to allow players to solo if they want to, but still retain group balance
- 5 classes for each realm
- Magic will be spread across realms, each realm will have a DPS magic user
:20:00 – Crafters as classes; role in combat
- Crafters will not be able to fight 1v1 vs RvR classes
- CSE wants to attract crafter only players
- Role very important in places like The Depths
- Need crafters to build bridges, defenses, etc.
23:30 - The Depths/ The Veil
- More info on the Veil later in the Kickstarter
- Player Controlled NPCs: you will be out of combat you either have died or cannot enter The Depths
- If you die in The Depths you can watch on “showtime”
- Go to a Place of Power, sacrifice character to become NPC monster
- Wide range of Depths NPCs: everything from annoying things to killers and Bosses
- Whole groups of players can sacrifice at PoPs
- Crafters need to go out to The Depths to construct defenses
- Not just pre-made traps; Need to think strategically
- The Depths change based on what realm controls it
- “Think of it as a living creature”
:33:30 - Sieges
- Sieges will take time; will not be easy
- Siege warfare is not about instant gratification
- “Will not make it fun to keep-trade”
- “Not 5 minutes, but not 5 weeks either”
- “Cannot happen instantly”
- Realm coordination required for progress to happen
:37:00 – Drawing in new people
- “Setting out to make a certain type of game”
- If some people don’t like it, too bad
- “The only thing I want to do is sit down and ask ‘what can I do to make this the best friggin RvR game out there.’”
- “Pre-orders in the PC space have never been huge.”
- Pre-orders, in this case Kickstarter, represent a fraction of potential community size
:44:00 – Character progression
- More horizontal progression than vertical progression
- High level characters will not be able to instantly kill low level characters
- “Soft” level cap
- Slower progression
- “Find ways of rewarding people who help their realm whether it’s through crafting, or traditional RvR.”
:48:30 – Guild Politics
- “Living guilds” concept
- “Guilds are important and need to be important”
- “Want guilds to work together”
- Don’t want mega-guilds to dominate serversm
:56:60 – Crowd control and positionals
- Love positionals
- “Integral in DAoC. No reason why we can’t do better this time”
- “We need to find a way of taking them to the next level”
- Crowd-control is a touchy subject
- In CU, there has to be crowd-control
- There will be zergs, but we also want 8v8, and solo battles
- Smaller groups need CC to fight the bigger realms
:59:30 – Death Penalties
- Death needs to be important in RvR games
- Significant penalty, some travel times, but you will be rewarded for this extra effort as well
- “We want to have a bit of pain, we want to have a bit of sacrifice, but then we want to reward you for winning”
1:04:00 – Pre-existing Keeps in RvR/What RvR stuff is their other than The Depths?
- Other realms can destroy your realm if you are in The Depths
1:07:00 – St’rm
- Wings are not vestigial; wings are useful
- The role of dragons will not be what people are expecting
- Dragons will not just be things you have to kill
- Dragons are not tied to Celtic myths in CU
- “Not as simple as, dragons are bad, kill them”
1:10:00 – Races
- Familiar and new races
- “Piercing of the Vail changes everything”
- Variants on old races
- “We don’t need another game that has sparkly, pointy eared, wise elves”
- “Having a mix is important”
1:14:00 – Collision Detection
- Viable tech option
- “Collision detection is something we will be able to handle.”
- “All for it if we can come up with a system that is not prone to abuse”
- “Must be able to maintain frame-rate”
- “Nothing is more important than having a smooth and cool experience in RvR.”
Waiting: CU, WildStar, Destiny, Eternal Crusade
Playing: ESO,DCUO
Played: LotRO,RIFT,ToR,Warhammer, Runescape
Comments
“Pre-orders in the PC space have never been huge.”
Hahahahahaa
spin spin sugar, this is the same guy that bragged about both DaoC and Warhammer pre-orders near their releases and Skyrim and Starcraft 2s latest expansion broke pre-order records on the PC, both topping 1 million pre-orders...
And youre going to tell me Skyrim and Starcraft 2 only sold 1 million copies?
Preorders are a small fraction of total sales. Preorders 2 years in advance while a game is just starting development are an even smaller fraction of total sales. Thats all he said.
For those who didn't listen to podcast, MJ's quote on pre-orders was that in PC space preorders for games represent a small percentage of the number of people that will buy/subscribe to the game when it's released. (which is true obviously) and further the percentage of people willing to donate to a game that is 2+ years away (kickstarter) represents an even smaller percentage of the would-be-preoder people.
So yes, he is correct on both counts.
Actually, I never said either. DAoC had terrible pre-orders and VUG only thought it would sell about 40K copies at launch. I've said this multiple times over the years.
As to WAR, what I've said (again, multiple times) is that WAR's pre-orders were the highest for any PC game that EA had ever released up to that time.
Mark Jacobs
CEO, City State Entertainment
Waiting: CU, WildStar, Destiny, Eternal Crusade
Playing: ESO,DCUO
Played: LotRO,RIFT,ToR,Warhammer, Runescape