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Your ideal mmog
Antioche
Member UncommonPosts: 132
I was thinking, a scary thing I know, that we spend a lot of time complaining about how this game or that game sucks, and how the mmog genre is just producing the same banal boring uninventive trash, for the most part. So it would be great if people would think of what their ideal mmog would be like. Be as descriptive as you want, or be as brief as you want. If it's just one aspect you'd like to see, or a specific feature you think would be great to have in these games just write about that. The point of this thread( which will most likely die quickly as it seems that there is a good reason people only complain instead of attempting to move in a positive direction) is to be CREATIVE and remain focused on that concept. This is not a thread to flame other mmogs, so please make your own thread for that, or use the countless other threads that exist for it. I'll refrain from adding my own ideas in the op. Hopefully people respond well to this. 
It is pathos we lack, and this lack of pathos makes the worlds we explore quite stale.
Comments
-Benhamine
{IT'S HERE}Tank and Spank: Two Gamers' Quest for a Good MMO{IT'S HERE}
It is pathos we lack, and this lack of pathos makes the worlds we explore quite stale.
http://www.mmorpg.com/blogs/Antioche
There's a lot of factors that go into making my perfect MMO, but my main one is a well made entertainer, dancer, musician class.
When I think of an entertainer class, I think of SWG, being in the club (cantina) all day chatting it up and you know, having fun, interacting. But there is no game on the market with a really well developed entertainer.
It would be cool if the entertainers in the game were REAL musicians. For example, instead of grinding by pressing a button, you have to compose your own music. It will give you a staff with measures and you just get to write.
Same thing goes with Dancer, design your own dance steps. Gives you diagrams and you can design new dances.
New instruments would be cool too. Instead of having like, a drum, clarinet, saxaphone, and guitar, you could have instruments that go with the genre of the game. If it were a middle ages game, have some Bodhrans, Bassoons, Crumhorns, Fyfes, and Hurdie Gurdies. For the Future era, have electronic drums, whailing guitars..and uh.. future stuff.
Anyways, that's what would make a game for me.
WHAT?!
caught my attention. Like, do you just press a button and strum? Does it have notes and you line them up to make a song?
Wanna play LOTRO so bad now, but I hate the movies.
I just read through your, if you're AK on the site you posted, ideas on battle systems/quests etc. I think I do agree with you to some extent. The current quest module that is used in mmorpgs has become stale. In fact allow me to make it obvious that one of the biggest problems with mmorpgs in general is that they have succumb to McDonaldization. read this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McDonaldization
Now I liked what you had to say about open ended quests. I think one issue that devs face is creating a quest system that isn't uniform/predictable. Although that kind of system is easy to use, it becomes boring very quickly. Ultimately if you're not occupying yourself in some other way while you complete grind tasks, like talking to friends on vent/listening to music/etc. You'll become quite bored quickly.
So what would be a good quest system. I think that a quest system that doesn't necessarily have pre made quests for players to complete with pre designed rewards etc. Instead, if the world had a more organic flow to it. Where events occur for several reasons: natural order of things, historical causation, influence/action of players, etc. Essentially if the world your avatar lives in typically has various factions of intelligent beings who have desires/needs for resources then these factions will naturally attempt to secure said resources for themselves of their own volition. How they do this is up to them, so to speak, but really it's up to the devs. Now it would be great if advances could be made in AI that would allow such npc factions to examine their "needs", create a plan to fulfill those needs, and then carry that plan out. The plan need not be the most efficient, or practical. It could be cluttered with the flaws inherent in said faction. The likes/dislikes and cultural nuances should definitely play a factor. This concept doesn't only have to be for intelligent beings(sentients beings is what i mean by that), but it could be used for creature types as well, but obviously instincts would play the greater role.
The actions of these non-player entities would create opportunities for players to take part in effecting the outcomes of these entities' attempts to secure resources, or whatever they are attempting to do. Better still would be the ability of players to actually choose to help or hinder. And based on such choices the player would also affect how he/she is viewed by other players/factions. If I chose to aid a faction that was trying to secure a gold mine that was under the control or a player faction, or attempting to help a faction that wanted to raid/gain control of a player, or non player run town this would affect how the citizens of that town would treat me, and players as well. This could certainly add a new dynamic to player vs player encounters.
The most important part is that the world would change based on such actions. If a faction decides to eliminate another faction, and is successful in doing so, the eliminated faction would cease to exist, except in the history of the world perhaps, and the memories of players/non-players. Not only should this be an effect, but also the landscape should change as well. Razing buildings, towns, cities, etc. should cause these things to be no more. A more complete ability to interact with the world would be achieved by this.
As a side note I seriously think that permanent death needs to be tried, and since the only game that I know of that actually had this was diablo 2, not an mmorpg, it would be nice to see an mmorpg actually launch with this feature.
It is pathos we lack, and this lack of pathos makes the worlds we explore quite stale.
http://www.mmorpg.com/blogs/Antioche
WHAT?!
caught my attention. Like, do you just press a button and strum? Does it have notes and you line them up to make a song?
Wanna play LOTRO so bad now, but I hate the movies.
When you go into Music mode you character equips whatever Instrument is in their In-their Instrument slot and your Number keys 0 - 9 turn into notes. I saw some examples and managed to play Twinkle twinkle little star. I cant remember link of examples.
It is pathos we lack, and this lack of pathos makes the worlds we explore quite stale.
http://www.mmorpg.com/blogs/Antioche
It is pathos we lack, and this lack of pathos makes the worlds we explore quite stale.
http://www.mmorpg.com/blogs/Antioche
I find it amazing that by 2020 first world countries will be competing to get immigrants.
I like Paulscott's ideas and would like to add:
Mob AI that simulate life. Feeding on each other, hunt in different areas atdifferent seasons.
Something else than the usual Tolkienesque races. A mix of SF/fantasy, like Dune, Nausica
RIP Orc Choppa
After being a part of the gaming community over a very long time ,and seeing what type of people are playing i have come to a saddening conclusion.Cheating is the number one issue that has to be addressed in ANY game out there be it MMORPG or MMOFPS.
The game developers need to sit down and create a concrete way to keep cheating/virtual sales out of games.Instead i am starting to see a shift in developers joining in on the huge amounts of money this is bringing in.They see the millions companies are making off games they own zero virtual rights to,and appear to be giving up the battle.When someone said "MONEY IS THE ROOT OF ALL EVIL" they were 100% correct.
Games that cater to speed levelling and solo play are the worst culprits.Lamers see this as a way to make several players and sell them online for real money.Then you get power levelling firms who can power level your player to 50 levels in a week.Then of course there is the players who can totally bi pass a games design by buying from RMT to speed up there gaming.There is ALOT of very sad gamers out there ruining it for all the rest.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
It is pathos we lack, and this lack of pathos makes the worlds we explore quite stale.
http://www.mmorpg.com/blogs/Antioche
World PvP for land control sounds great. Can you flesh this idea out? What's the point of controlling land? Are there different reasons for controlling different regions/areas? What about including a non-player element into it?
Yeah player made items - I'd go 100% personally. As well as item durability. Eventually all items should fall apart.
Magic has certainly been quite simplistic in other mmorpgs. It would be nice to see more complex magic systems that make the players really think to use. Perhaps involving a kind of puzzle system or something in order to cast the spell. The more complicated the spell the more complicated the puzzle you have to complete, and make them randomized. Or something like that.
Why would you limit the amount of lore. And when you use the word lore what exactly falls under that category?
It is pathos we lack, and this lack of pathos makes the worlds we explore quite stale.
http://www.mmorpg.com/blogs/Antioche
Mine dream mmo would be like a fps with spells. Players and npcs would have tiny amounts of health so it only takes a few seconds to kill with a spell. There would be loads of story stuff. Politics and the economy would be easily exploited by players to create a exciting atmosphere.
No kills x and collect y quest. All stories would be like a single player game (involved)
However, I think that PvP is needed for several reasons. The main reason is that if there is no pvp allowed then this forces all players to be on the same side. This limits the freedom of players to choose how they want to play their character quite a bit. People rarely all are on the same side, they have different ideas about how things should be done, different motivations based on beliefs, etc. And while it would be nice for us all to get along and be on the same side and fight against the "bad guys" this concept just simply is too unrealistic for many to accept it. It's like how in the movie the Matrix they talk about how the first Matrix was a perfect place, but humanity rejected it. And while I don't want to get into a deep philosophical discussion about this, I think it is important note that PvP has it's place in mmorpgs, and the ones that refuse to seriously put it in future games will see that their games probably won't survive. Now player vs player doesn't have to mean killing the other player. Competition is good enough, sports etc. are our modern version of warfare. No one dies, for the most part, but we're able to use quantifiable means to see who is the best. To dominate etc. PvP allows players to choose sides in any conflict, and certainly there can be more than two sides. It would be very dissappointing for many people in the USA if suddenly we only had 1 team for each sport we were all forced to root for. Who would they compete against? Other countries I guess, how about a single team for each sport for the whole world. Pretty lame. It's a lot more fun when there are a lot of teams competing.
It is pathos we lack, and this lack of pathos makes the worlds we explore quite stale.
http://www.mmorpg.com/blogs/Antioche
Well I will go more specific and say my ideal fantasy mmorpg.
-main focus of grouping but soloing can also be done
-quick ease in finding group, quick ease of getting to destination, ease of if someone leaves group of finding another and options if someone needs to go afk.
-A good fantasy environment style without being 'alienlike' or 'cartoony'
-performance, a good performance game like WoW> a low performance game.
-Starting experience different everytime you start a new character
-Many distinct and rewarding classes
-world events like mobs invading towns, or raid mobs you can join together with other groups in a spur of the moment rather than a drawnout process.
-emphasis is gameplay, not how much xp you have got. Watching a pixel is overrated.
-Crafting whereby it is enjoyable to craft not just enjoyable for the 'end product'
-challenge, incoporate some sort of strategy type play
-A good economy
I'll take a stab at it.
PvP: Like Shadowbane - you kill'em, you loot'em (with a percent chance to drop equipped, based on your Karmic Rating (you pwnzors lowbies, your Karmic Rating drops hard - and makes it very likely you will lose all equipped gear in addition to inventoried items)). To prevent PvP from becoming a requirement - just use the idea from DAoC's RVR areas. PvE on your "sides" home area, with a open and free PvP Area in the middle. To make the PvP area beneficial, only allow player cities in the PvP areas, the best PvE Loot there, the best Materials for crafting, etc. Those that never venture into the PvP zone will have the option for good loot, but only if the person who ventures or thrives in the PvP areas decide to sell. Create a symbiotic relationship between PvE and PvP oriented players. Don't segregate your playerbase entirely.
Solo PvE: Lineage2 - Higher Difficulty in Leveling quickly, slow Gold gain, and big dependence on grouping - without actually getting a bonus to xp amounts when grouping.
Group PvE/PvP: Let's making grouping with 1 or two other people just a better way to kill mobs quicker. No real bonus. But if you get a full group with a specific variation of Classes, you get certain bonuses. For instance, a 10 person group with 3 tanks, 2 healers, 3 Melee Damage Dealers and 2 Nukers would have a balanced xp gain, but get bonuses on Melee Damage, and maybe better chances at Melee Loot. While a Distance Heavy group will get penalized for their lack of Melee's with a lower defense to Melee Damage, but an increase in Archer/Nuker Damage or lowered casting times, plus a better chance at nuker or ranged melee type loot. Have this work out in both PvE and PvP - maybe we'll see a heavier reliance on Guilds, Groups and Social Relationships in Game. Rather than everyone switching over to the FotM class.
Skill Progression: SWG - Open it up wide. Want to merge a Nuker type with a Heavy armor wearer or a Healer with an Archer, etc? Feel free. However, hybrid classes would see a decrease in how well they do something. Specialized character classes would gain bonuses and benefits. Hybrids would see a decrease in their healer or melee or nuker damage or casting times, etc.
Combat: Planet Side - Make the full on switch from Code to Skill requirements. Planetside did it right with their target recticle expanding (decreased accuracy) when running; or decreasing (increased accuracy) when kneeling or Laying down, in size. Bonusus to accuracy would come in the form of the recticle shrinking, etc and the reliance of Tools (healers would need wands or something, combat characters would need swords or polearms, etc) and their quality levels.
Crafting: SWG (in it's original form) - Make crafter a very detail oriented profession. Make it something people can level on, so they don't need to do combat to get levels to craft better components. Put a reliance on the player run economy to gathering materials for higher quality builds. But allow crafters to set things to automatically build groups of items, so that if they log for the evening, they can log back on after school, or work and find 33% of the project done. Then they can work on other things while that finishes (but make it so that crafting timeframes when doing batches takes longer if the player is offline vs.when they are online - good luck on finiding a way to prevent people from just leaving their characters logged in...if it's even necessary..)
Spatial Relationships: Lineage2 - Do not let PC's walk through NPC's or other PC's. But figure out a way to prevent offline players from leaving their characters in doorways in an attempt to grief others.
Loot: Make the highest end loot the best but make the drop rate so low, that Crafters are more important, for the masses. At lower levels make items either store bought or player crafted. No low level drops. With bonuses only on crafted items, etc. Making the crafter an integral part of the player economy is a key factor for a successful game.
Cities: Shadowbane or SWG - Cities need to be player owned, with a chance for total loss. But apply code that limits when a city can be lost based on the defenders preference for times - like shadowbane. Or if there's a better idea or concept...
These are some of the things I'd like to see in a new MMO. The main setting would either be a Shadowrun environment (futuristic world with magic) or a straight fantasy environment. These seem to sell better than other genre's.
Mado
My ideal game would be skill-based with PvP and a gentle slope of gear upgrades (i.e. the difference between low end gear and mid-level gear be small, and between mid-level and high level also be a small step up). As the game goes on and new items are introduced, I'd rather see different combinations of effects added to gear, rather than ever higher stats with ever harder mobs to compensate.
I'd like to see a skill cap that forces people to make hard choices about their character, but leaving flexibility to rework the character so that there is no way to completely and hopelessly screw up a character.
I'd like to have a world with social positions in the game to be filled by players to create a sort of civic life, with the actions of people in those positions affecting what kinds of simple (kill/collect, for instance) quests are available in the area they control, or even perhaps spawning military quests that involve leading NPCs to move to and fortify realm defenses. (I imagine a sort of pop-up RTS style map interface to manage what the realm/city needs harvested, bought, or sold and also to nudge people toward where you want to defend or attack-- opening up the chance to defend/attack beyond the controlling guild, to give all "citizens" an opportunity to participate in their town's life).
I'd like to see temple-based quests and events that bring the religion system of the world into play-- perhaps providing city or realm-wide buffs for followers of that particular deity, or granting special abilities to clerics of that deity for the period of time that the deity is pleased, and decreasing their effectiveness if the deity is displeased. Perhaps those who specialize in priestly skills would have different spells and abilities available depending on what temple or deity they affiliated themselves with. Perhaps there could be an option to be independent from temples and a whole set of priestly abilities organised around the principles of animism.
Perhaps that system could be echoed in mage-type skill sets that are particular to one or another school of magic. Perhaps you could learn some from one and some from another, after gaining favor with each, of course-- but perhaps at the expense of effectiveness across the board. Perhaps there could be a sort of wild magery that arises out of just raising mage skills without affiliating with a school, and maybe that would have a set of spells that are very powerful but very unreliable.
I'd like to see other kinds of quests that players at every level of the game can participate in together that culminate in some event that changes the game world without a pre-scripted outcome and several possible outcomes, and after that event for those quests to be unavailable and for new quests/events to be available based on the result of the event and moving the game toward the next major game change-- a sort of branching story line that would make every server a unique game.
I'd like to see character abilities that make being a pure resource producer or purely social player possible (farmers, miners, entertainers, and shop keepers) viable. That is, I'd like a variety of viable non-combat paths. If there were some incentive for the ruling party of the area to extend protection over those people, all the better. Some sort of apprentice system to give benefits to older characters for helping out newbie characters would be good too-- even if it means people are using it to twink/pl their own second accounts.
I want the world itself to be detailed and compelling. I like herds of animals moving together, ambient critters and noises, beautiful landscapes, and other areas that are devastatingly stark. I want different cities to have their own architectural style. I want NPCs to exhibit cultural differences-- the way they dress, the way they react when approached, the sort of things they might be willing to ask a stranger to do. I'm not even asking for great leaps in AI-- just a little more thought with the tech already available. And, while we're at it, I'd like to see better writing in the game text all around.
I've got some more specific ideas that I thought might make for interesting games, but I don't know that they'd be all that interesting as reading material. (LOL) I am just throwing out random ideas right now.
[EDIT: In addition to all that, I'd like to see people have the ability to totally ignore the civic life of the town and, for instance, spend all their time hunting deer or building a cabin in the woods and defending it from constant goblin attacks... Freedom to do anything you want is paramount, but for people who want to work together on a story larger than their own, it would be good to have that too, and have results based on how those people chose to solve the problem rather on just trying to get to the next part of the story already cast in stone.]
...
This is where I draw the line: __________________.
Can you describe how the gamers listed above ruin it for all the rest? Is it because someone who has more time on their hands, and likes to be the first, actually has the audacity to BE the first person on a server to complete some quest or obtain some item? Before you, the grouping, social-butterfly, casual player can spend 1-2 years getting to that level to get the items or...Fame?
Sure, people who buy characters don't actually earn the characters or items or gold in-game. But perhaps it's because of their focus on Real Life that allows them to successfully make enough Real World Cash to spend on In Game Items/Equip/Characters/Etc. So who's the harder worker? Who deserves the stuff more? Hardcore PL'ers or Successful-At-Life Casual Players?
In the end it all comes down to whether or not you can find enough reasons to outweigh your displeasures with a company or game (SoE or WoW perhaps) - so you can enjoy what you are paying to play. And if you're not paying, they why are you bishing?
Mado
Actually, I would say the person who deserves the in-game items are the ones who work IN-GAME to get them. End of story.
My ideal MMO would include various ways to prevent the secondary market ( black market ) from taking hold. My ideal MMO would be run by people with the testicular fortitude to do everything within legal rights to take care of business. Perma-ban em all.
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Support Independent Game Developers
for example here are a few non fighting classes (doesn't mean I want a class based game) that came from the top of my head; this thread is about creativity right? these classes still can chose to fight but since they will probably not have high skill pts in swords, they won't want to.
skill trainers: these people are reqired to learn skills. who teaches skills to skil teachers is another question though. a warrior goes to a trainer and learns skills for money. there are good trainers and not as good trainers. so good ones will be sough after. learning a skill from a good trainer must have an advantege such as slighly better stats in that skill at the cost of paying more money of course.
since playing an MMO - or any other game- is all about power -making a more POWERful char or beating your opponent in chess- it sounds hard to imagine it to be fun teaching skills to people. I mean teaching skills will not give most players the same satisfaction as doing 2000+ damage to someone. because there is no "owning" or, more generally, "power" involved. still the power parameter can be implemented on a non fighting character in the form of money. the best skill teachers will make lots of money -maybe more than any soldier- and they will have better houses, maybe can buy castles, and can hire NPC guards maybe, and it will take lots of poor soldiers to kill one rich "skill trainer".(or other non fighting char).
entertainers: they can entertain people by making music, playing games, gambling etc. if you are a good one maybe you can have your own casino some day. also the morale of soldiers can be a parameter for fighting. so good entertainers will be sought after by guilds so that they will do better in the battle.
crafters: they are absolutely necessary for buiding the world andthe items. their reward is the world they build (plus money of course). for my part I would have fun playing a char who could design-build houses for people or build cities in a team of crafters.
merchants: they travel to distant lands by caravans and sell things to crafters, soldiers and other players. a merchant can start by collecting things -loots maybe- and bring them at people's convenince. or bring goods from other cities and sell people what they can't find in that area (they ll have to hire guards to do travel in caravans). make some money that way and then start manifacturing simple stuff and then get richer and more powerful, etc.
and politicians of course. they can be any other class such as a soldier or merchant. they are just people who has made some money earlier and now spending their time on ruling the world. sounds fun
these are not well thought classes. they are merely a few examples just to underscore the idea that in order to create a living WORLD, non-fighting classes/players must be there and they must be a lot of fun play with. Otherwise it is not a world, it is a huge battle field.
We see it already on eBay and in-game auction houses. Why not make it part of the game itself?