First thing that have to change to have any kind of next gen mmo is to separate RPG from MMO!
Lets face it , i am roleplayer , and i play this types of games for immersion and roleplaying - but 90% of other players wiew them just as multiplayer games to them roleplaying is a burden.
And it is unnecesarry. So make a clean cut MMOG no roleplaying at all - and pow! You suddenly oppened immense gameplay improvements!!!
-No need to stick to some old boring fantasy concept - Be dark elf hunting mutated ogres with blaster while casting spells - why not? It is game dude.
-SW type crafting without a need to justify it in "story"
-Heck do anything that improves gameplay - no need to worry about beliveability!!!!
On other hand - please finally make at least one - the first one MMORPG!!!!
With enviroment that actually supports roleplaying, a living world, GM events...etc (roleplayers know) Free of dudez (because they will fint the MMOG much more interesting and cool)
"Before this battle is over all the world will know that few...stood against many." - King Leonidas
The whole time I'm reading your article I'm thinking, Ultima had that, Ultima had that. Ultima had all the things you described, albeit some in limited fashion because of technological limitations of the day it was created (1997) and because it was the first true MMOG that paved the way for all other MMOG's to follow. It might have been light on the questing side and the character customization is pretty archaic by today's standards but it had all of the features you high lighted as needed in a game for it to be the ultimate MMORPG. Player Customization, Mounts, Player Housing, Player Cities, Guilds, Factions, good PvP, excellent story line and setting and the #1 reason the Ultima Online kicks all ass, it had a pure skill based system exactly like you described in your article, no limiting classes. It allowed endless diversity of the playerbase and replayability with dozens upon dozens of skills to pick and choose from. Letting you create any kind of character you wanted. A lockpicking, blacksmithing, archer, fisherman, mage-hooker? You got it! How could the MMOG genre started by such an amazing and ground breaking game that got it so right get so far off track? Two words, EverQuest or forEverQrap as I like to call it. The games that followed in UO and EQ's wake unfortunately decided to go the EQ direction, which as we see today has set us back for almost a decade in this budding genre. UO started the genre off at Level 10 with features. EQ took us back to 4 and we've been progressing back to 10 ever since. Have we got back to 10 yet? Not quite, and I think your article confirms this.
For me; UO skill system, housing cusomization etc. Who ever came up with leveling should be shot :P I really liked the citywarfare in shadowbane; so that should deffinitly be in.
I somewhat liked the crafting system from EQ2. but it was too time consuming. I did like that you needed help from others and that certain rare resources could create rare stuff (like more rare spells etc...). The crafting system was also somewhat skill based; I mean, playerskill. You had to get a proper hang of it to create your pristine items. Took to much time though. So getting NPC help with some of the processes would be good. (I honestly think that a good craftingsystem can make a very big contribution to a mmorpg; it attracts another type of people also, which gives more athmosphere to the game :P)
Questing system; Well.. There should be quests ofcourse. Gotta do something when your not hanging around with your guild, defending your city etc... :P. This is a thing UO lacked indeed. I can't say which quest system has my preference though; EQ2, but with smaller timers for the spawns...
I myself have my hopes set on darkfall online. It will have skillbased progression instead of leveling, it will have city/empire building/conquering, it will be skill bases PVP, if what I've read is true. The darkfall programmer said in his blog that the combat system will be somewhat like this one: http://taleworlds.com/
heh. From what I've read in here I should take a look at dark & light. But; my last hope on the horizon is darkfall.
Originally posted by Lepidus A question for those of you responding to this article...Your opinion of this piece aside - is this something you would find interesting to see more of on the site?Edit: To be clear, I meant editorials in general.
Yes, but only as long as they are on a subject thats somewhat original. The above article was a decent example.
A bad example is the onlife articles written at Gamespy, with such nifty topics as "the leveling tread mill" and "selling things ingame for real money". Some horses have been beaten to death and dont need to be dug up again - that stuff has been discussed to the point of Its like when someone starts another thread on "what are some good free mmorpgs"
Crafting: SWG (collecting recsources, mining them, the vendor system)
Combat: SWG or WOW (all the abilities and 'extras you could use' aswell as a proper feel when fighting with other players)
Community and roleplaying: it would have to be SWG :P (how guilds were managed and set up was great! your own towns and mayor top notch stuff)
I guess it's starwars but with better graphics, but something that can base itself around a film or something BIG always has attention and feel in the gameplay
One thing I like about MMORPG's is the ammount of different paths you can take, which means no leveling! SWG was great for that too until the CU but I'm told it's still as good!
Instead of trying to invent some fictional MMO based upon ideals, the wiser solution is to look at successful MMO's and build your model around their successful formula.
"No one will ever agree on what features are the most important in an MMORPG, but if one game had all the features, then it would make sense that that one game would have a great majority of the market. " WoW already has more users, domestically, then EQ, EQ2, AC, DAOC, SWG and CoH...combined. Their asian numbers will exceed Lineage soon, making it the largest MMO ever, so obviously you are incorrect.
There is 1 thing and 1 thing only that ensures capturing a "great majority" of the market....EFFECTIVELY implementing a known universe. I put effectively in caps because Matrix Online has shown that just using a known universe and doing it poorly guarantees you're ass is sold off and you'll change your name so no one knows you destroyed the franchise.
Why is WoW successful? Because it has 10 years of history that MILLIONS of people know and have enjoyed. No one is throwing some guy named Mithanial Marr at you and trying to get you engaged in the content. You walk through the world of Azeroth and every day you run into people you've known for the last decade. WoW's customization is lacking, the armor looks much the same like it did in early EQ, but it has a HUGE amount of diverse content, all of which is engaging because we knew it before we got there. It's population is growing exponentially, still, and shows no sign of slowing.
Why isn't SWG more successful? Quite frankly, because Sony hates customers. I played and retired from SWG 3 times, each time a friend lures me in, I get engaged, then Sony bends me over with yet another change and destroys what I'm enjoying about the game. They have no vision, no concept of what people enjoy, and no understanding of what it takes to keep their customers happy. When Raph Koster publicly says "I know we're seeing a 25% turnover rate on customers, but I consider that acceptable", that should be a HUGE warning bell that you are only a check to them. Sony rifles through your purse and climbs out the window the next morning.
Why isn't CoH more successful? Because they did not follow the formula. Who the hell is Statesman? What genius said "Hey, lets build a game about comic books! Everyone loves comic books!" without taking into account that everyone loves SPECIFIC comic books, because they enjoy the heroes and the story. There is no one comic book that everyone enjoyes, though there are franchises that people enjoy more than others. Had they partnered with DC and made Gotham City Online, they would have had a MUCH better chance at being successful. Making it all up from scratch and expecting people to care is why they're slowly declining and retiring servers right and left.
Bottom line, there are some basic assumptions that we can make about every MMO that's even remotely successful: Great Graphics, high-lvl customization, significant energy put into content. Yadda yadda yadda, it doesn't have those things, it won't make it off the shelf. This are minimum requirements.
So what's the real requirement? Engaging content. A reason to play. A reason to be in the world. In SWG, I'm some sex toy for Sony to whip until I surrender. In EQ/EQ2, I'm some ugly grinding toon working on some god who I've never heard of for some trinket. In CoH, I'm some very customized toon fighting some other toon in the exact same way I fought the million before him and will fight the million after him...for the greater good, or something. In WoW, I'm playing a toon that's a member of a faction that I've been playing, in some form or another, for the last decade, just in a different form.
One day, this young developer the writer was talking about will design a game, and when he does, he'll sit all his technical engineers out in the hall and ignore them, and talk to SOCIAL engineers to see why people play these games in the first place. If you've played > 1 MMO, you know the rules that an MMO dev must follow, because there are only a handful of reasons people leave MMO's, and they're VERY easy to understand and avoid...if you care, obviously not a problem Sony is overburdened with.
That is a customer-derived list of the new content that is coming into WoW. We know it's coming because it's in the books and the old games, we've experienced it in other forms, we see the gates, we see the spots on the map. How many games slap on an add-on and people go "There's a new continent? Why? Where? Why is it there?" When the players themselves know what the new content is, and it's history, BEFORE the devs have published anything about it, you have an engaged customer base.
IMO there are only 2 things that distinguish a game, Community and the "fun factor". These things can make players overlook many shortcomings and become long time players. To me it seems that many game builders forget that it is fun that keeps us coming back for more. It is not the graphios, not the combat system, not the neat pixel items, - IT IS FUN that wins.
Originally posted by underwed IMO there are only 2 things that distinguish a game, Community and the "fun factor". These things can make players overlook many shortcomings and become long time players. To me it seems that many game builders forget that it is fun that keeps us coming back for more. It is not the graphios, not the combat system, not the neat pixel items, - IT IS FUN that wins.
Sorry but i just must comment this. You are actually claiming that WoW is good because lot of people are playing it?
Lets translate it to the real world. You are saying that big mac is is the top gourme enjoyment, and coca cola is the drink of gods? Heck, you are saying that Titanic is the best film of all times ?!
Just because a product is hugely consumed doesnt mean it is actually that good. It is extremly well marketed , easily consumable and simplified so it can appeal to wide range of people
The problem is that money is making the world go around. So you can forget about quality - just expect more of watered down for enjoyment WOW EQ fast food
"Before this battle is over all the world will know that few...stood against many." - King Leonidas
Here's what I think. My perfect MMORPG would vary depending on what it was set in. If it was a Fantasy MMORPG; They gotta make it so that you could do almost anything you could in real life. Instead of every level you get five stat points, you would have to go do a little mini game where you would lift up rocks and run around the city hence increasing your endurance and strength. Also, you should be able to make your charactor anyway you want based on actions, feelings, and physique. If your guy went around some roman city just killing people for instance, you would probably turn evil. If you made your guy think that everything was scary, he would grow up to be a little wimp that stays in his house. If your guy just slaughterd monsters 24-7 then he would be buff. If the MMORPG was in the future (space, another futuristic planet, ect...) then you should be able to walk around where ever you want as your avatar, but still be able to navigate in space with some sort of a space ship. That was my biggest problem with EVE is that you could never get out of your ship. So then you would have two kinds of levels, your regular leve (when your inside your avatars head) and your space piloting level. Well, those are my thoughts on how to make a perfect MMORPG. Oh, and one thing I forgot to add for both of them. I really detest the whole point, click, then wait for your avatar to kill the monster. It would have to be real combat, and there would be real damage after words. Say your guy fought a bandit and he got sliced in the cheak before he beheaded him. The that slice would stay there for a certain amount of time. If he went to a doctor then it would heal a little faster. If he got hit in the same place again while it was still healing, then it would do a little extra damage. Wow, I never enough knew I could type this much! Oh well. This is what I think anyway.
I don't know if it was mentioned earlier in the post but ,add some gore to the games WoW is way too chartoonish for me. Most MMO's don't have much gore in them but i think it would be fun. Some where along the lines of Fable would be nice. Lopping off heads and stuff, or having your Necro strangle an peasant, something fun. All MMO's IMO should have a server dedicated to all out PvP for the more hardcore players, and a PvE server. Not like WoW where you can not kill your annoying alliance partner. I would love to see some realism in these games. Maybe a consequence system so if you kill someone for no reason at all and a guard see's you, you get flagged as a murder and if you do it with no one around you don't. Just rambling
I totally agree. I want to see heads getting lopped off and arms and legs chopped clean through. Why all these candy-arse approaches? UO had to be the most gory so far, letting you chop people up into pieces and take their head for a bounty reward or as a trophy to keep in your home. Seriously, couldn't every game have a slider for total gore of heads and body parts flying everywhere to the point of no blood at all? Let people see what they want to see in battle. We're tired of just seeing some sparks and small drips of blood wizzing through the air. I guess the Conan game will be adding the head lopping stuff wihch is a a step forward.
Everything in that artical was awsome. I agree to almost everything that was said. The main thing in MMO's thought, for me, are these;
Chacacter Custumization - It needs to be unique. I want me my char to look different. I want me char to be it's own. I dont want to look like every other human or elf running around out there! They need to make everything changable. Hell, even design our own hairstyles if we could. Be able to change everything from mixing two eye colours togther to the size of a female chars breasts! I want be able to make me char look her own, unlike others.
Races/Classes - This is something that always makes me crigne in MMO's. I want a TONNE of races and classes to pick from, and I want to be able to play the race I like with the class I like. I HATE when I find a good MMO. But I wont play it because I learned I cant play this cool race and be a Healer! (I play a healer in every MMO, never been anything but) I want the Cat races! I want the wolves and the foxes. Lizards and Snakes. Humans, Barbarians, Dwarves, Halflings, Elves (Dark, High, Wood, Half). Trolls, Orges, Goblins. Cenitaur. Minitaur. Griffons, Dragons, Phenixoes. Winged (Humans with Bird wings, etc) and Brood (Human with Dragon wings, etc). I want the Clerics, Shamans, Druids. Necrolytes, Dark Priests. The Knights and the Deathlords, Paladins and Berzerkers. Heck, make some new classes too. And make any playable by any race. If I want to be that Cat Cleric let me!
Realization - I'd love to see an MMO where, not only could you live in a home, but you could build your own. Find a place outside the big cities, a nice country cottage. Or rent a room in one of the major towns, live in the centre of it all. Or even Build your own cities for your Guilds or Clans. Hell, be able to choose if you wanted to be the GReat Savoir of <Blah>, or live at home on a farm, craft and help the econemy of your town. Ya, I said farm. Why not? Why not allow people to be able to own a Farm, cows, chicken, plants. Hey, ever play Harvest Moon? Or why not both? After a long day of Traveling, use your spell to call home to meet your family. Which brings up Families. Marrage? Why not? Oh ya, I'd also love to see more emotes. Be able to go into a Tavren in the City and sit down at the bar, have a few too many and get drunk, why not?
These are just somethings I'd thought I'd through out, enjoy!
See, I have this idea for an MMO that allows you complete freedom to be-do whatever you want too. Since I am still writting the storyline, I am not going to share some details, however I will list some of the features I plan for it. Also, im not a coder im more of the creative writer type, so if any devs out there interested feel free to leave me a messge in my mmorpg mail.
The games name is called "Omega" sub title "New Beginning, Dark Horizon"
This would be a Sci-fi style - If I had to compair it to current games out there, I would have to say EVE meets SWG meets Homeworld mixed with others, but with its own uniqueness and flavor.
In writting this I have tried to imagine the best of what this game had to offer, and seems to change as I continue writting. I will list the features I dream of for Omega, but is always subject to change.
Full character customization: Starting with a base model, you design the character from eight, to weight to build, to shapes of facial features - to a slew list of tattoos to scars you can place anywhere on your characters body. This is not just a click to see the next one availible, you have complete control of your characters look. If the character customization tools too comlex or you dont want to spend that much time, you can pick dozens of already created features to your characters look.
Skill's Theres several different sets of skill trees such as personal combat skill tree, mechanized skill tree, pilot, leadership, and socialization to name a few. Your class is decided based on your actions in game and the skills you learn. Skills are not just use your skill points and place them in skills to raise them, or you are the right level and you buy the skill. Based on what you do in the game allows you to earn skill points in that area - Thus you purchase basic skill's. As a player uses the basic skills and get better at them, your player will then open up the ability to open up new skill trees for more specific types of skills based on the area your player takes. Basically it would be summed up to more specialized areas in that skill base.
Oh did I mention one server for all? All players will log into the same server. This game will have full open PVP with area's that are protected by NPC's and Players so you decide :P
Omega is to bring you the best of different game types. Example, Combat (flight) Simulator for when your out in your fighter or other craft. RTS - this type of game play varies into different parts of the game from leadership manageing civilians, cities and planets to Homeworld type fleet comander - to ground battles commanding and objective setting. 2nd person style combat for when your just in your character form, with a FPS style combat with addition to damage based on skill base and possible accuracy.
Alignment system - Since Omega is open PVP - then it would only make sence to have an alignment system to help players keep track of friend and foe - Basically a player's alignment is based off of what they do in the game - killing other players will draw negative aligment to not only the player - but there guild (this will aslo effect your guilds aligment with that players guild) and that players home base city, planets etc... In guilds you will know when you run into another player out there if they are friend or foe by the color of there name. Grey = guildie, blue = ally, light blue = friendly, white = neutral, Yellow = Aggresive, OJ = Hostile, Red = War.
Cities besides the starting cities are all player build and managed along with seperate economies mixed with universal economey all player ran. Each player gets to like in Sims build your own house with styles based on enviroment and credits availible. City leaders manage city zones (building zones simular to simcity) and manage the overal look of the city along with transportation systems, taxes, laws and ordieneces, defensive and Law enforcement NPC's and so on.
Guilds: Guilds in this game are going to be very important for your players future - not saying that you have to be appart of a guild you can feel free to freelance if you wish. Guilds are the main core of management systems. Guilds have several different levels, each level with its own abilities and property management systems. New guilds called clans to that may own a portion of the property with in a city or trade franchizes - to growing into Allegences owning planets to possibly growing into a Federation alliance owning star systems. the Guild system is quite complex and I am not willing to share most of it at this time.
Crafting - well like real society everthing around you was researched and manufactured - well same in Omega - not including starter stuff, every item or technology will be researched by players, and other societies - and manufactured by players - players can own any type of commerce they choose and hire NPC's to run them at your absence and so on.... Crafting such as a tailor might take a racial model and completely design the outfit and add attributes based on skill to those items...
Be a city leader, be a corporate tycoon, be lone warrior, or a war lord, explorer, industrial giant be what ever you want, sell your business and buy a fleet and go explorering your not limited in Omega.
I would go on, but I do not wish to over extend this :P If you want more information feel free to contact me through mmorpg email.
Wow Tatsit. That sounds pretty interesting. You have very good ideas and I like the way you planned your game. Now if only SOE or Blizzard had someone that thought like you... Anyway good luck with the game!
If a character is wearing a pack, you will see the pack. If they have a weapon slung over there shoulder, you will see that weapon. None of this pulling stuff out of nowhere.
and if you have a mount, either its alive or mechanical - its up to you to protect it and keep an eye on it (of course you can pay for someone to guard them)
Lets say your character in a battle gets his arm shot off, well your armless... well at least until you can get to a cloaning center and have it transplanted. If you get blasted and loose all your limbs, well hope you have a friend who can pick you up and carry you to medical before you bleed to death. (this feature is undecided yet).
Also your character will be effected by elements such as heat, cold and weather.
one night where i couldn't sleep, i put my thoughts on what i'd make if i could make a good MMORPG, i've come to thoses ideas :
First : the world.
It has to be futuristic world, because medival is way overused, so i thought bout either post apocalyptic, raw futurist or something from an existing universe (like Frank Herbert's DUNE for example would be a great universe for MMORPG).
2nd : Factions.
2 different approaches are the best IMO, first one is shadowbane's with its "all powers to the players guilds" and 2nd one is realm based a la DAOC.
So let's say we take 4 factions, 1 for each element, (earth, wind, water, fire) each faction would have its perks/flaws (better tank for earth, better dmg for fire, or stuff like that), this would work also for different DUNE houses if we keep dune's example (Atreides, Harkonnens, Guild, ...)
3 : Classes/ Races.
Each realm would have its different set of classes (like DAOC), and each class would be useful for both PVE and PVP (like a tank could prevent his/her tam members to be targeted, we'll see that later), races could be common to all realms with one or 2 specific to each realm (for example humans should be everywhere, but elemental only for the specific element).
The possibility to mutate into new classes could be envisaged as well (genetically modified, elementalized, imbued with magic, or anything like that)
4 : World areas
The world would be divided in few areas, like DAOC, One area for each realm which would be quite protected, and where noobs could lvl without being ganked (like u can see in WoW with lvl 60 epic alliance sitting their asses at the Xroad to gank lvl 10-20 horde, how heoric, especially for paladins) and there would be area in each of theses realms open to attack.
On top of that, there would be an open-war areas between each realm motherlands, thoses areas would be controlled by forts or fortified cities and would be very incentive to whoever controls em (see further for more details)
5 : Guilds and cities
Each guild could build her own city in her mother realm, in areas where pvp would be enabled. There should be enough space for each guild to build one city.
The area controlled by the city would allow the guild who owns it to access to the resources of this area, thoses resources could be harvested a la SWG or via other gathering systems. The resources would shift every (insert duration here, for example every month), which would prevent one guild to have all the good stuff.
Guilds could focus their efforts in different domains :
- Harvesting : this would hire npcs making harvesting faster for the guild
- Protection : this would hire combat npcs who would protect the city and its structures from enemy realms members attack.
- Research : this would make research of new objects faster, once an object is researched its production is possible (every item has to be researched only once)
- Production : this would make items production faster.
- Trade : this would allow the guild to put merchants in the capitol and other npcs controlled cities, setting more merchants in the guild's city, and allow bigger merchant capacity.
This resource system would be point based, a guild would have more or less points considering its monthly achievements (dungeons, pvp, ...) and could divide the points like she wants, from a scale to neg 5 to +5 (or -10 to +10), negative points would hinder the area affected and positive would help it. This would be useful for example when a guild doesn't want to harvest more, but needs to speed up a production.
6 : Guild system
A lot of utilities could be used for guilds, like a guild roster with integrated DKP system, diferrent roles (leader accountant and all), a listing of each member with its pvp rating, pve rating, lvl and all.
7 : Craft
The craft would be of 2 kind :
- Guild based (see before) where people would put up big production of items according to the guild resources
- Personnal (would follow approx the same path than SWG)
8 : Classes
I thought bout thoses classes so far :
- Tank : nothing much to say, would be both useful for pve and pvp
- Pilot : would control vehicles outdoors and drones inside dungeons, could have something like a power armor outdoors and battledrones inside instances.
- Medic : a la AO
- Soldier : would be like a warrior in FFXI, large choice of weapons, which would be useful for the special combos moves
- Sniper : like AO or SWG, rifle user long range, nice dmg, but come close and he's a wimp
- Infiltrator/fixer/pirate : the rogue class, with hacking skills, useful for fort taking, and stuff like that, a grid travel a la AO would be cool too imo, this class could allow disguise to another realm for infiltration purpose.
- Elementalist (or psi for dune or anything like that) : for people who love to play with magic stuff even if they are in a futurist world
and much other classes, i didn't really think about that so far.
9 : Travel
This is a point where a lot of games suck, we would need here to have a large variety of different vehicles, from the quad to flying aircrafts (like in AO), some would have weapons, some wouldn't, and the pilot would have access to very good vehicles with a lot of weapons and all.
A grid transportation could be as well envisaged, this was a nice concept in AO
10 : skills
Skills could be class related, but also some other skills could be learnt by people (like vehicle control, craft, or stuff like that), Eve's skill system is nice imo, since u start from scratch and u can build ur char as u want, it just takes time, but in that case there's no class system, so i think there should be a balance between class oriented characters and skills common to everyone (with some special skills unlockable in the game)
11 : PVP
The pvp could be in any zone that allows it (a lil like the mitigation zones in AO), and the zones where guild cities would be possible would be open to war, and other realm members could sabotage guild cities facilities, slowing the production of other realm guilds.
The "inter realm" zones controlled by forts, would allow guilds to set up outposts that would be very incentive (access to special resources, faster r&d, ....), would bring points to the guild, and the zone's control would allow the controlling realm to enter special dungeons, with special bosses.
Each fort could be taken by a different faction every week (or something like that), and when a fort is taken, the different guild outposts would be open to attack as well for a certain period of time, this would allow the conquering realm to claim spots for its own guilds.
Also there would be special skills/items/race mutation available for people based on their pvp results.
Pvp should give points only when killing characters of a lvl close to urs (ie no reward for killing 'grey noob')
12 : Death and item decay
The best system for death i think is the 'clone system' like AO, SWG, EVE, whatever, when u die, u just activate a clone, and if ur clone is recorded with ur current xp/hp/lvl, u don't loose anything, if the clone is old tho then u loose the difference between ur clone and ur actual char. Cloning could be done for free at cloning facilities, or for a charge at range.
Items should decay but could be repaired by different 'offers' :
Max time/money : item repaired to 100% condition, would take the most time n money
Max time or max money : item repaired to 90% condition
and stuff like that. This would allow people to leave out their item for repair, wait some time and then get it back repaired without paying, or paying some to not have any delay.
13 : World Design
I think L2's char designer would be the best, or a korean/japanese art team, because they are by far, imo, the most skilled graphists to give a good style to a game.
14 : char customization
This is important to have a char that u like, so SWG/EQ2 and stuff like that char customization seems the best, with 2 mandatory things :
- Cloth simulation (cuz cloth and hairs in swg seem glued to the character, bad, very bad)
- Whole bunch of accessories and cloths (like in AO)
Also vehicles, houses, and stuff could be customizable and furnished at will (like in SWG)
Well theses are the thoughts i had when i couldn't sleep this might be a lil messed up, but i think this would make a nice game.
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My idea of the ultimate mmorpg! For years i have always wanted an earth sim starting in the stone age with a few families of cave men the rpg is about your family and its future but you control one char at a time , they age and die off so you start crafting and molding a new char after only a short time. The world eveolves with weather , natural disasters and what not. while it populates more and more resources and technology becomes available to you . Here would be a ty[ical example of a family: The jetsons came from south america where they built seafaring vessels after goerge the 3rd died his son moved to north america and became a cowboy his son then formed a crime syndicate and so on
with professions ranging from mechanic to horse trainer to politics every profession you could imagine even farming.
of course there would have to be a limit on server max and there would be tons of servers just very small servers
You could be a bar owner or a pirate or just about any thing immaginable
like in most mmorpgs it loses its thrill after a few months and you think hmm ill make a new char to keep it interesting so you end up with 4 chars and non are uber ....in this mmorpg once your main char ages and dies you start fresh as a young new char free to do whatever you like
and the fact that history can be changed is really wierd say the american indians actually kept there country and ruled north america ...well that could happen in this game or the germans actually one ww2
thats were the fantasy part comesin to play just my thoughts lol
All his points are valid, just some minor disagreements and additions.
Player housing is fine if you can find a way for it appear "alive". SWG had ghost towns littering the landscape, giving the appearance that the game was dead...while the main cities were huge, sprawling expanses of empty buildings with an inn or bank thrown in occasionally. Solution? Cheap apartments in town, very expensive houses out in the wilds. Would make the cities look "lived in" and control the number of empty houses littering the landscape.
Quests and mob UI...something needs to be done to make them change at random or monthly ...ANYTHING to negate the fan site spoilers. Devs come up with excellent encounters with challengese that are only challenging until the spoilers come out....this makes the player base breeze through content that should have taken much longer to master...with the dev team having to resort to PvP "sandboxes" in order to attempt to keep up with the player need for content.
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I believe that all players should feel powerful.
This can be little things like running fast. Of course the mobs would run just as fast, but look at CoH...you instantly felt powerful by running fast and leaping over everything....instant fun...sadly the game lacked any semblance of depth so players tired of it quickly.
Big guilds and raids and LFG. Get rid of the concept. Throw it awy. It only results in limiting the life of the game. I was in a top guild for 5 years in EQ, so I know the advantages a big guild has, but the big guilds with the ubar equipement results in 90% of the players feeling wimpy very quickly. It results in new players being reluctant to even start because they are so far "behind"...thus natural attrition is not countered by enough influx of new players.
All players feeling powerful and in control of their fun means the loss of power by a select few, such as guildleaders or "needed" classes. One wonderful result of "battlegrounds" showing up in games is that players don't have to LFG to play. I believe much of the class struggle and class envy and cries for solo content would be eliminated if there was NO PvP except in RvR and/or battlegrounds, with no 1v1 or even dueling. Yes, eliminate dueling too since it promotes the class envy and the flavor of the month classes. Get rid of anything that harms the cooperative, congenial play such as was seen in early EQ before the epic weapons made huge raiding guilds a necessity to get "your epic", people picked guilds for friendships, not because of what a guild could do for them, you didn't care what another class had, you chose a class for what "fit", not what would get you in a group.
Solo is not a 4 letter word.
Every single MMORG with a forum has hundreds of players begging for solo content, even after the early levels. It does not mean soloists should be playing single player games. Solo and late-game charactor advancement should not be mutually exclusive. It should be a viable option with excellent rewards...just make the solo content difficult and able to do in stages over a long period of time to justify comparable rewards to what a hardcore raiding guild gets...afterall only 1 to 5 of those people in a 50 man raid are even doing anything resembling challenging, the others are just there to follow orders and stay awake.
Take that concept one step further and make PvE either soloable or have the automatic grouping of anyone who wants in, is in....with encounters adjusting accordingly. Sure, still have grouping and raiding but have it as a choice...not as the only way to have fun or advance your charactor.
Overall, take the permanant advantage of "hardcore" players (I've been one) out of the picture...sure let them attain the good stuff quicker but not have the ubar items only attainable by 50 people doing a dungeon over and over at 5 hours a streatch. ...then the next dungeon is geared for the hardcore guild with the phat loot and is more out of the reach of the normal player...and it goes on and on, until the devs are essentially programing for a couple megaguilds on each server...with the rest feeling like wimps.
Oops gotta get ready for work, grats to anyone who actually read all this.
EDIT--as a side note, I believe that the next generation successful MMORG should have extensive use of voice overs for NPCs..some have starting using them, but no one has made them an intregal part of their game to the extent that NPCs have definite personalities and lots of varience. This will add a lot to making the game more immersive. I expect more in game use of player use of voice (as a designed part of the game) to eliminate the constant typing and reading, where a player actually talks to an NPC and gets a response.
i agree with all his points however as he mentioned he did overlook some points, one being GAME CONTENT! i dont think any game can servive without good game content. Everquest probably had the most content of any mmo out there, one could play for 6 years and Still be getting lvls and AA's and loads of new gear, there was really no end.
WoW suffers in this area considering it has a mere 5 high lvl instances with 1 more on the way. also considering that there instances breaks them down even more, wheres the competition to get to that zone first between guilds. that also creats a relativly EASY game, where as i walk into ironforge and everyone is wearing the same armour sets.
Every game needs in depth low end and high end content to make it so players ALWAYS have new things to do after maxing out there lvl.
First I think there is something far worse than the combat then just the autoattack button and the special skill light ups in most everygame today. That is the simple fact that devs have decided we are no better than a hamster in an exercise wheel. Yay I just started the game so I get to go kill rats. OOO Im level 2.. where is the slightly larger rat? WOOHOO DING! I made level 60/100/500/10million where is the gargantuan rat of blight and decay at? Combat in general is not only boring but so is the meaningless nature of the slaughter. I'm sorry you put a big bad mother of all demons in a game and my party kills that (insert term for female dog here) then there should be a decrease in the population of demons. But instead while you are sitting their healing resing or regenerating the witch returns like nothing happened.
Secondly and most importantly in my eyes was something that SWG did pretty much exclusively. Too bad with the recent publishes have gone out of their way to hurt these roles rather than help them. This is the noncombat classes. Something that is built for the roleplayers. In swg they have the entertainers. One of my fondest memories of swg was meeting people in the cantina, becoming friends and the 5 of us (a wookiee musician/bh (myself) a human master musician/smuggler (qody) and 3 master entertainer/dancers (1 human 2 twi'leks)) traveled from npc city to npc city (this was before player cities) as a troupe performing far and wide. We then started choreographing dances to music, specific dance flourishes to different waves within the music, and even wrote songs that our characters sang. An Eopie with No Name is one of my favorites from then. We were hired by guilds to perform weddings, perform at parties, everything and it was a BLAST. Not once did we ever have to pick up a weapon and kill a rat. There are no other games, that I am aware of, that embraced the rolplayer like SWG did prior to the release of WoW. Unfortunately the SWG dev team is tryign to oversimplify what was so strong and good with their game to cater to the twitch gamer. And swg is starting to slide from mmorpg to mmoag (mmo Action Game). Embrace us. Embrace the roleplayer. Did Richard Garriott become the successful man he is today by goign for mass market appeal? Or did he cater to the niche market who's fans are loyal intelligent or creative.
Allow us to choose our roles and give us the means to play those roles. ONLY then will you have succeeded in making an MMORPG rather than an action game with the basest of elements common to an rpg. Stats and skills alone does not an rpg make.
I think I may have posted here before (8 pages whoo) but after playing a bit of Shadowbane, my opinion on the matter has changed anyway, so.......
Everything that the character does should be heavily tilted towards player skill: combat, crafting, whatever. I used to think it should be balanced, but the reason for the change of mind is two-fold. One, I've played enough point-click-wait games (and so has everyone who plays) that I will seriously vomit if I have to play another. Two: WHAT THE #$%&* do you think fighting is?? Games are meant to be engaging. If people in SB can plant their character next to a monster spawning point and LEAVE THEIR COMPUTER.. then something is really broke. The FPS idea is really a good one IF it is implimented correctly.
Keep in mind that the phrase ROLE-PLAYING isn't just accidentally there. I'm not talking about speaking ol' english and removing conjuctions from your speech, but come on, people. You're PLAYING A ROLE. If you're playing a fighter, you should expect a lot of twitch, because that's what being a fighter is; hopping around trying to hurt others while you don't get hurt. If you LIKE click-wait, then what the $#* do you WANT to play a fighter for?
So I put you off being a fighter so Waa, you cry, what else is there? If you're playing SB, then the tragic answer is... not much which more than anything else in SB makes it a crappy game. Whoever thought up the idea of unrestricted warfare (on a potentially grand scale) and forgot the simple fact that no matter who the combatants are they have legions of crafters on the payroll was a true idiot. If you don't have an economic infrastructure, then what the #$%* are you fighting for? And if you HAVE and economic infrastructure, why can't the players be involved in it. Speaking of crafters?? something more interesting than click on ingredients and then click 'make' please... Jes*s F**k*ng CH**ST!
Usually the answer for why the players aren't involved in the economy comes down to "The devs are scared the players won't do what they want." To which I say "Cry me a river. Shut up and provide what you promise." If you build a good system, then no matter what the players come up with, it will stabilize itself. If you don't build a good system, chances are you'll f**k up a bunch of other things, so just don't bother.
I still agree that characters should be 100% customizable in terms of what skills they can take and what kind of 'profession' they can play. Race might make 'suggestions' Maybe dwarves have penalties if your a mage and elves have bonuses, but they should be slight and not deciding factors. Classes and levels are an archaic hold over from so long ago, most devs probably don't know where it came from, just that everyone's doing it. It doesn't work, it causes more problems than is solves so stop it already.
At game launch at least, the world should be almost completely unpopulated by NPCs. A few NPC cities for newbie protection based on faction affiliation and that's it. That being said, NO QUEST SYSTEM. I know I'll catch a lot of flack for this, but I'll say it again: NO QUEST SYSTEM. The best quests are player initiated and player driven. To that end, the NPC's must be dynamic. They should migrate, hunt, defend their territory, etc. The explanation I read for how NPCs were to be handled in Darkfall was the best I've seen. Mobs spawn all over, a teeny bit at a time. The places close to the cities, the players will eradicate or utilize. The ones in the far corners will grow. When the NPC population reaches a certain point, they form camps, villages, towns and eventually cities. These can be benevolent or bad guys. At each higher stage, more powerful NPCs are spawned and more of the lesser ones and also commanders are spawned who will actually take control of groups of NPCs and move around with them. These NPC groups can go hunt their enemies, trade with friendlies and even settle other areas. If you have a good system like that and a good economic system, then quests take care of themselves. There will always be something for you to do, and someone willing to pay you to do it. This was also a failing of SB. The mobs never moved and never changed their difficulty. You always knew where to find them and so did your enemies and all the griefers in the game. You knew how far away you had to be so they wouldn't attack you. Just once, I want a game where the NPCs could decide your city was undefended and to take you out. Of course that would mean you had to defend your city 24/7. That's where NPC defenders came in, but SB didn't go far enough and allow NPCs with players on the offensive or (and here's the interesting bit) players JOINING NPCs already on the offensive.
Yeah, I know some people are going to say "Well you can't be expected to be online all the time." To which I respond "You don't have to be online ALL the time, but if you expect to do something as grand as rule a city, you better be prepared to be online as often as it does take." Anything else (SB and UO come to mind) allows real estate to be snapped up and kept WAY too much and suddenly there isn't enough room to put anything else.
There's a lot more... but basically that's it. Customizing your characters look is important I guess, but I see it the same as graphics and sound. It can add a lot to an already good game, but until you get the mechanics down right, don't even try to bother me with how the game looks or sounds or how cool your toon might look.
I agree with everything that you say in the article. I dont like alot of what todays mmo's are doing with the gay leveling system...Yup Thats right GAY whoever keeps using this later in mmorpgs should be shot.
About the necron 2 thing where you can aim your weapon, i think this is an awesome concept and i think in fantasy genre games they should use this when it comes to ranged weapons such as bows and javalins and stuff. I would get so addicted to a game where i control where im shooting without actually just targeting and waiting.
Also I want to be able to enhance my skill with a weapon instead of enhancing my skill with just me just like in necron 2.
"Oh let me kill this rat, and i will gain experience and this will make me better at life."
Developers...Please do something different next time around
Next Generation of mmorpg's my @$$! heheh ignore that ive been playing Coh for hours. god damn hypocrite
play:LoTRO status: dragging tried: WAR, FFiX, WoW, Guildwars, Silkroad, Vanguard, AoC, Sword of the New World
The perfect game obviously incorporates all aspects of every MMORPG out there. Here is my idea I had a long time ago
I am a Shadowbane player and even though that game has its troubles, it has to be the best PvP game on the market with asset loss and a free for all PvP feel. Not everyone likes PvP so my idea revolves around a few games tied together.
1) You start out on a Leveling island that is full of quests and instances. You can create a guild or solo (DAOC Style) for your levels. You do not leave this island until your max levels. This will take away from the ever so annoying Lobie gankers. IMO there is NO place for this, its just stupid.
2) Now that your character is leveled, its time to make a choice on what direction your high level game experience wants to go. Choice 1) Free for all world (shadowbane style). Here you can create player cities, set sieges and fight over land ,resources, keeps etc. There are a lot of ways to make this very interesting. The politics are key in this world by making allies and enemies. In this world there will also be available guild quests that help you acquire items for the good of your Nation. The big difference is while on a quest in these lands, you are fair game for PvP. If you complete a quest you get large rewards. This takes away from the HOURS and HOURS of farming needed in other games. The farming will still be available if you wish to solo for extra gold and items but the main focus is teamwork in the quests. There is a lot more that can go into the world that can be discussed and refined. Choice 2) Enter the world of the High end Instances and Quests. (EQ Style). While still being able to own your own guild city, no PvP will be available here. You main goal is to complete High-level raids to unlock harder and more interesting adventures. This zone also will have single adventurer quests and instances if someone just wants to play alone. They can also build a modest cottage in the world as well. Again a lot of ideas can enhance this idea.
After your character creation you will have your abilities and basic items needed to enter each world. At this time you will need to pick a profession. Blacksmith, Alchemist etc. Now you can start to create items for yourself or sell at an auction (WoW) The auction is an awesome thing, you place the items on an auctioneer and if it sells you get your gold. You do not have to stand around for hours yelling I have items for sale. Also the Mailbox (WoW) was another awesome idea, just simply mail items to friends even if they are not online.
Travel is always a pain on MMORPGs. I think if you combine a few ideas together it makes for a better experience. A) Everyone can buy a mount for faster travel (WoW,DAOC) Cities that are in the same nation can inter travel through portals (DAOC) C) Generic locations with flying creatures available or rune gates (WoW, Shadowbane) D) Character Summoners. (Shadowbane) Really, spending hours running around looking for a fight or to get to a city the quest sends you to really isnt pleasant. Make travel a lot easier.
With all this being said, there are a lot more things in my mind but this would turn into a book. Anyway, hope you all agree and hope someone takes these ideas and develops a new adventure MMORPG that everyone will enjoy.
P.S. As for the leveling, make it fast. Nothing worse then spending 2 months questing and being only ½ way done your toon (WoW,EQ)
Comments
First thing that have to change to have any kind of next gen mmo is to separate RPG from MMO!
Lets face it , i am roleplayer , and i play this types of games for immersion and roleplaying -
but 90% of other players wiew them just as multiplayer games to them roleplaying is a burden.
And it is unnecesarry. So make a clean cut MMOG no roleplaying at all - and pow! You suddenly oppened immense gameplay improvements!!!
-No need to stick to some old boring fantasy concept - Be dark elf hunting mutated ogres with blaster while casting spells - why not? It is game dude.
-SW type crafting without a need to justify it in "story"
-Heck do anything that improves gameplay - no need to worry about beliveability!!!!
On other hand - please finally make at least one - the first one MMORPG!!!!
With enviroment that actually supports roleplaying, a living world, GM events...etc (roleplayers know)
Free of dudez (because they will fint the MMOG much more interesting and cool)
"Before this battle is over all the world will know that few...stood against many." - King Leonidas
Two words, Ultima Online.
The whole time I'm reading your article I'm thinking, Ultima had that, Ultima had that. Ultima had all the things you described, albeit some in limited fashion because of technological limitations of the day it was created (1997) and because it was the first true MMOG that paved the way for all other MMOG's to follow. It might have been light on the questing side and the character customization is pretty archaic by today's standards but it had all of the features you high lighted as needed in a game for it to be the ultimate MMORPG. Player Customization, Mounts, Player Housing, Player Cities, Guilds, Factions, good PvP, excellent story line and setting and the #1 reason the Ultima Online kicks all ass, it had a pure skill based system exactly like you described in your article, no limiting classes. It allowed endless diversity of the playerbase and replayability with dozens upon dozens of skills to pick and choose from. Letting you create any kind of character you wanted. A lockpicking, blacksmithing, archer, fisherman, mage-hooker? You got it! How could the MMOG genre started by such an amazing and ground breaking game that got it so right get so far off track? Two words, EverQuest or forEverQrap as I like to call it. The games that followed in UO and EQ's wake unfortunately decided to go the EQ direction, which as we see today has set us back for almost a decade in this budding genre. UO started the genre off at Level 10 with features. EQ took us back to 4 and we've been progressing back to 10 ever since. Have we got back to 10 yet? Not quite, and I think your article confirms this.
The key to a great MMOG is Freedom
For me; UO skill system, housing cusomization etc. Who ever came up with leveling should be shot :P
I really liked the citywarfare in shadowbane; so that should deffinitly be in.
I somewhat liked the crafting system from EQ2. but it was too time consuming. I did like that you needed help from others and that certain rare resources could create rare stuff (like more rare spells etc...).
The crafting system was also somewhat skill based; I mean, playerskill. You had to get a proper hang of it to create your pristine items. Took to much time though. So getting NPC help with some of the processes would be good. (I honestly think that a good craftingsystem can make a very big contribution to a mmorpg; it attracts another type of people also, which gives more athmosphere to the game :P)
Questing system; Well.. There should be quests ofcourse. Gotta do something when your not hanging around with your guild, defending your city etc... :P. This is a thing UO lacked indeed. I can't say which quest system has my preference though; EQ2, but with smaller timers for the spawns...
I myself have my hopes set on darkfall online. It will have skillbased progression instead of leveling, it will have city/empire building/conquering, it will be skill bases PVP, if what I've read is true. The darkfall programmer said in his blog that the combat system will be somewhat like this one: http://taleworlds.com/
heh. From what I've read in here I should take a look at dark & light. But; my last hope on the horizon is darkfall.
Yes, but only as long as they are on a subject thats somewhat original. The above article was a decent example.
A bad example is the onlife articles written at Gamespy, with such nifty topics as "the leveling tread mill" and "selling things ingame for real money". Some horses have been beaten to death and dont need to be dug up again - that stuff has been discussed to the point of
Graphics: EQ2 (they were good, you can't argue)
Crafting: SWG (collecting recsources, mining them, the vendor system)
Combat: SWG or WOW (all the abilities and 'extras you could use' aswell as a proper feel when fighting with other players)
Community and roleplaying: it would have to be SWG :P (how guilds were managed and set up was great! your own towns and mayor
top notch stuff)
I guess it's starwars but with better graphics, but something that can base itself around a film or something BIG always has attention and feel in the gameplay
One thing I like about MMORPG's is the ammount of different paths you can take, which means no leveling! SWG was great for that too
until the CU but I'm told it's still as good!
Instead of trying to invent some fictional MMO based upon ideals, the wiser solution is to look at successful MMO's and build your model around their successful formula.
"No one will ever agree on what features are the most important in an MMORPG, but if one game had all the features, then it would make sense that that one game would have a great majority of the market. " WoW already has more users, domestically, then EQ, EQ2, AC, DAOC, SWG and CoH...combined. Their asian numbers will exceed Lineage soon, making it the largest MMO ever, so obviously you are incorrect.
There is 1 thing and 1 thing only that ensures capturing a "great majority" of the market....EFFECTIVELY implementing a known universe. I put effectively in caps because Matrix Online has shown that just using a known universe and doing it poorly guarantees you're ass is sold off and you'll change your name so no one knows you destroyed the franchise.
Why is WoW successful? Because it has 10 years of history that MILLIONS of people know and have enjoyed. No one is throwing some guy named Mithanial Marr at you and trying to get you engaged in the content. You walk through the world of Azeroth and every day you run into people you've known for the last decade. WoW's customization is lacking, the armor looks much the same like it did in early EQ, but it has a HUGE amount of diverse content, all of which is engaging because we knew it before we got there. It's population is growing exponentially, still, and shows no sign of slowing.
Why isn't SWG more successful? Quite frankly, because Sony hates customers. I played and retired from SWG 3 times, each time a friend lures me in, I get engaged, then Sony bends me over with yet another change and destroys what I'm enjoying about the game. They have no vision, no concept of what people enjoy, and no understanding of what it takes to keep their customers happy. When Raph Koster publicly says "I know we're seeing a 25% turnover rate on customers, but I consider that acceptable", that should be a HUGE warning bell that you are only a check to them. Sony rifles through your purse and climbs out the window the next morning.
Why isn't CoH more successful? Because they did not follow the formula. Who the hell is Statesman? What genius said "Hey, lets build a game about comic books! Everyone loves comic books!" without taking into account that everyone loves SPECIFIC comic books, because they enjoy the heroes and the story. There is no one comic book that everyone enjoyes, though there are franchises that people enjoy more than others. Had they partnered with DC and made Gotham City Online, they would have had a MUCH better chance at being successful. Making it all up from scratch and expecting people to care is why they're slowly declining and retiring servers right and left.
Bottom line, there are some basic assumptions that we can make about every MMO that's even remotely successful: Great Graphics, high-lvl customization, significant energy put into content. Yadda yadda yadda, it doesn't have those things, it won't make it off the shelf. This are minimum requirements.
So what's the real requirement? Engaging content. A reason to play. A reason to be in the world. In SWG, I'm some sex toy for Sony to whip until I surrender. In EQ/EQ2, I'm some ugly grinding toon working on some god who I've never heard of for some trinket. In CoH, I'm some very customized toon fighting some other toon in the exact same way I fought the million before him and will fight the million after him...for the greater good, or something. In WoW, I'm playing a toon that's a member of a faction that I've been playing, in some form or another, for the last decade, just in a different form.
One day, this young developer the writer was talking about will design a game, and when he does, he'll sit all his technical engineers out in the hall and ignore them, and talk to SOCIAL engineers to see why people play these games in the first place. If you've played > 1 MMO, you know the rules that an MMO dev must follow, because there are only a handful of reasons people leave MMO's, and they're VERY easy to understand and avoid...if you care, obviously not a problem Sony is overburdened with.
Decent article, just extremely naive.
Edit: Here is an example of what I'm talking about - http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.aspx?fn=wow-dungeons&t=88127&p=1&tmp=1#post88127
That is a customer-derived list of the new content that is coming into WoW. We know it's coming because it's in the books and the old games, we've experienced it in other forms, we see the gates, we see the spots on the map. How many games slap on an add-on and people go "There's a new continent? Why? Where? Why is it there?" When the players themselves know what the new content is, and it's history, BEFORE the devs have published anything about it, you have an engaged customer base.
IMO there are only 2 things that distinguish a game, Community and the "fun factor". These things can make players overlook many shortcomings and become long time players. To me it seems that many game builders forget that it is fun that keeps us coming back for more. It is not the graphios, not the combat system, not the neat pixel items, - IT IS FUN that wins.
Sorry but i just must comment this. You are actually claiming that WoW is good because lot of people are playing it?
Lets translate it to the real world. You are saying that big mac is is the top gourme enjoyment, and coca cola is the drink of gods? Heck, you are saying that Titanic is the best film of all times ?!
Just because a product is hugely consumed doesnt mean it is actually that good. It is extremly well marketed , easily consumable and simplified so it can appeal to wide range of people
The problem is that money is making the world go around. So you can forget about quality - just expect more of watered down for enjoyment WOW EQ fast food
"Before this battle is over all the world will know that few...stood against many." - King Leonidas
I don't know if it was mentioned earlier in the post but ,add some gore to the games
WoW is way too chartoonish for me. Most MMO's don't have much gore in them but i think it would be fun. Some where along the lines of Fable would be nice. Lopping off heads and stuff, or having your Necro strangle an peasant, something fun. 
All MMO's IMO should have a server dedicated to all out PvP for the more hardcore players, and a PvE server. Not like WoW where you can not kill your annoying alliance partner. I would love to see some realism in these games. Maybe a consequence system so if you kill someone for no reason at all and a guard see's you, you get flagged as a murder and if you do it with no one around you don't. Just rambling 
I totally agree. I want to see heads getting lopped off and arms and legs chopped clean through. Why all these candy-arse approaches? UO had to be the most gory so far, letting you chop people up into pieces and take their head for a bounty reward or as a trophy to keep in your home. Seriously, couldn't every game have a slider for total gore of heads and body parts flying everywhere to the point of no blood at all? Let people see what they want to see in battle. We're tired of just seeing some sparks and small drips of blood wizzing through the air. I guess the Conan game will be adding the head lopping stuff wihch is a a step forward.
The key to a great MMOG is Freedom
I think Charactor Costumization (skills and such) Starwars is a good system...
tho i thinked that Anarchy online had 1 hell of a nice system to
Everything in that artical was awsome. I agree to almost everything that was said. The main thing in MMO's thought, for me, are these;
Chacacter Custumization - It needs to be unique. I want me my char to look different. I want me char to be it's own. I dont want to look like every other human or elf running around out there! They need to make everything changable. Hell, even design our own hairstyles if we could. Be able to change everything from mixing two eye colours togther to the size of a female chars breasts! I want be able to make me char look her own, unlike others.
Races/Classes - This is something that always makes me crigne in MMO's. I want a TONNE of races and classes to pick from, and I want to be able to play the race I like with the class I like. I HATE when I find a good MMO. But I wont play it because I learned I cant play this cool race and be a Healer! (I play a healer in every MMO, never been anything but) I want the Cat races! I want the wolves and the foxes. Lizards and Snakes. Humans, Barbarians, Dwarves, Halflings, Elves (Dark, High, Wood, Half). Trolls, Orges, Goblins. Cenitaur. Minitaur. Griffons, Dragons, Phenixoes. Winged (Humans with Bird wings, etc) and Brood (Human with Dragon wings, etc). I want the Clerics, Shamans, Druids. Necrolytes, Dark Priests. The Knights and the Deathlords, Paladins and Berzerkers. Heck, make some new classes too. And make any playable by any race. If I want to be that Cat Cleric let me!
Realization - I'd love to see an MMO where, not only could you live in a home, but you could build your own. Find a place outside the big cities, a nice country cottage. Or rent a room in one of the major towns, live in the centre of it all. Or even Build your own cities for your Guilds or Clans. Hell, be able to choose if you wanted to be the GReat Savoir of <Blah>, or live at home on a farm, craft and help the econemy of your town. Ya, I said farm. Why not? Why not allow people to be able to own a Farm, cows, chicken, plants. Hey, ever play Harvest Moon? Or why not both? After a long day of Traveling, use your spell to call home to meet your family. Which brings up Families. Marrage? Why not? Oh ya, I'd also love to see more emotes. Be able to go into a Tavren in the City and sit down at the bar, have a few too many and get drunk, why not?
These are just somethings I'd thought I'd through out, enjoy!
See, I have this idea for an MMO that allows you complete freedom to be-do whatever you want too. Since I am still writting the storyline, I am not going to share some details, however I will list some of the features I plan for it. Also, im not a coder im more of the creative writer type, so if any devs out there interested feel free to leave me a messge in my mmorpg mail.
The games name is called "Omega" sub title "New Beginning, Dark Horizon"
This would be a Sci-fi style - If I had to compair it to current games out there, I would have to say EVE meets SWG meets Homeworld mixed with others, but with its own uniqueness and flavor.
In writting this I have tried to imagine the best of what this game had to offer, and seems to change as I continue writting. I will list the features I dream of for Omega, but is always subject to change.
Full character customization: Starting with a base model, you design the character from eight, to weight to build, to shapes of facial features - to a slew list of tattoos to scars you can place anywhere on your characters body. This is not just a click to see the next one availible, you have complete control of your characters look. If the character customization tools too comlex or you dont want to spend that much time, you can pick dozens of already created features to your characters look.
Skill's Theres several different sets of skill trees such as personal combat skill tree, mechanized skill tree, pilot, leadership, and socialization to name a few. Your class is decided based on your actions in game and the skills you learn. Skills are not just use your skill points and place them in skills to raise them, or you are the right level and you buy the skill. Based on what you do in the game allows you to earn skill points in that area - Thus you purchase basic skill's. As a player uses the basic skills and get better at them, your player will then open up the ability to open up new skill trees for more specific types of skills based on the area your player takes. Basically it would be summed up to more specialized areas in that skill base.
Oh did I mention one server for all? All players will log into the same server. This game will have full open PVP with area's that are protected by NPC's and Players so you decide :P
Omega is to bring you the best of different game types. Example, Combat (flight) Simulator for when your out in your fighter or other craft. RTS - this type of game play varies into different parts of the game from leadership manageing civilians, cities and planets to Homeworld type fleet comander - to ground battles commanding and objective setting. 2nd person style combat for when your just in your character form, with a FPS style combat with addition to damage based on skill base and possible accuracy.
Alignment system - Since Omega is open PVP - then it would only make sence to have an alignment system to help players keep track of friend and foe - Basically a player's alignment is based off of what they do in the game - killing other players will draw negative aligment to not only the player - but there guild (this will aslo effect your guilds aligment with that players guild) and that players home base city, planets etc... In guilds you will know when you run into another player out there if they are friend or foe by the color of there name. Grey = guildie, blue = ally, light blue = friendly, white = neutral, Yellow = Aggresive, OJ = Hostile, Red = War.
Cities besides the starting cities are all player build and managed along with seperate economies mixed with universal economey all player ran. Each player gets to like in Sims build your own house with styles based on enviroment and credits availible. City leaders manage city zones (building zones simular to simcity) and manage the overal look of the city along with transportation systems, taxes, laws and ordieneces, defensive and Law enforcement NPC's and so on.
Guilds: Guilds in this game are going to be very important for your players future - not saying that you have to be appart of a guild you can feel free to freelance if you wish. Guilds are the main core of management systems. Guilds have several different levels, each level with its own abilities and property management systems. New guilds called clans to that may own a portion of the property with in a city or trade franchizes - to growing into Allegences owning planets to possibly growing into a Federation alliance owning star systems. the Guild system is quite complex and I am not willing to share most of it at this time.
Crafting - well like real society everthing around you was researched and manufactured - well same in Omega - not including starter stuff, every item or technology will be researched by players, and other societies - and manufactured by players - players can own any type of commerce they choose and hire NPC's to run them at your absence and so on.... Crafting such as a tailor might take a racial model and completely design the outfit and add attributes based on skill to those items...
Be a city leader, be a corporate tycoon, be lone warrior, or a war lord, explorer, industrial giant be what ever you want, sell your business and buy a fleet and go explorering your not limited in Omega.
I would go on, but I do not wish to over extend this :P If you want more information feel free to contact me through mmorpg email.
Tatsit
Tantus Games
COO/Game Director
Oh one minor detail i thought i should add....
If a character is wearing a pack, you will see the pack. If they have a weapon slung over there shoulder, you will see that weapon. None of this pulling stuff out of nowhere.
and if you have a mount, either its alive or mechanical - its up to you to protect it and keep an eye on it (of course you can pay for someone to guard them)
Lets say your character in a battle gets his arm shot off, well your armless... well at least until you can get to a cloaning center and have it transplanted. If you get blasted and loose all your limbs, well hope you have a friend who can pick you up and carry you to medical before you bleed to death. (this feature is undecided yet).
Also your character will be effected by elements such as heat, cold and weather.
well thats enough for now.
Tatsit
Tantus Games
COO/Game Director
Hi all,
one night where i couldn't sleep, i put my thoughts on what i'd make if i could make a good MMORPG, i've come to thoses ideas :
First : the world.
It has to be futuristic world, because medival is way overused, so i thought bout either post apocalyptic, raw futurist or something from an existing universe (like Frank Herbert's DUNE for example would be a great universe for MMORPG).
2nd : Factions.
2 different approaches are the best IMO, first one is shadowbane's with its "all powers to the players guilds" and 2nd one is realm based a la DAOC.
So let's say we take 4 factions, 1 for each element, (earth, wind, water, fire) each faction would have its perks/flaws (better tank for earth, better dmg for fire, or stuff like that), this would work also for different DUNE houses if we keep dune's example (Atreides, Harkonnens, Guild, ...)
3 : Classes/ Races.
Each realm would have its different set of classes (like DAOC), and each class would be useful for both PVE and PVP (like a tank could prevent his/her tam members to be targeted, we'll see that later), races could be common to all realms with one or 2 specific to each realm (for example humans should be everywhere, but elemental only for the specific element).
The possibility to mutate into new classes could be envisaged as well (genetically modified, elementalized, imbued with magic, or anything like that)
4 : World areas
The world would be divided in few areas, like DAOC, One area for each realm which would be quite protected, and where noobs could lvl without being ganked (like u can see in WoW with lvl 60 epic alliance sitting their asses at the Xroad to gank lvl 10-20 horde, how heoric, especially for paladins) and there would be area in each of theses realms open to attack.
On top of that, there would be an open-war areas between each realm motherlands, thoses areas would be controlled by forts or fortified cities and would be very incentive to whoever controls em (see further for more details)
5 : Guilds and cities
Each guild could build her own city in her mother realm, in areas where pvp would be enabled. There should be enough space for each guild to build one city.
The area controlled by the city would allow the guild who owns it to access to the resources of this area, thoses resources could be harvested a la SWG or via other gathering systems. The resources would shift every (insert duration here, for example every month), which would prevent one guild to have all the good stuff.
Guilds could focus their efforts in different domains :
- Harvesting : this would hire npcs making harvesting faster for the guild
- Protection : this would hire combat npcs who would protect the city and its structures from enemy realms members attack.
- Research : this would make research of new objects faster, once an object is researched its production is possible (every item has to be researched only once)
- Production : this would make items production faster.
- Trade : this would allow the guild to put merchants in the capitol and other npcs controlled cities, setting more merchants in the guild's city, and allow bigger merchant capacity.
This resource system would be point based, a guild would have more or less points considering its monthly achievements (dungeons, pvp, ...) and could divide the points like she wants, from a scale to neg 5 to +5 (or -10 to +10), negative points would hinder the area affected and positive would help it. This would be useful for example when a guild doesn't want to harvest more, but needs to speed up a production.
6 : Guild system
A lot of utilities could be used for guilds, like a guild roster with integrated DKP system, diferrent roles (leader accountant and all), a listing of each member with its pvp rating, pve rating, lvl and all.
7 : Craft
The craft would be of 2 kind :
- Guild based (see before) where people would put up big production of items according to the guild resources
- Personnal (would follow approx the same path than SWG)
8 : Classes
I thought bout thoses classes so far :
- Tank : nothing much to say, would be both useful for pve and pvp
- Pilot : would control vehicles outdoors and drones inside dungeons, could have something like a power armor outdoors and battledrones inside instances.
- Medic : a la AO
- Soldier : would be like a warrior in FFXI, large choice of weapons, which would be useful for the special combos moves
- Sniper : like AO or SWG, rifle user long range, nice dmg, but come close and he's a wimp
- Infiltrator/fixer/pirate : the rogue class, with hacking skills, useful for fort taking, and stuff like that, a grid travel a la AO would be cool too imo, this class could allow disguise to another realm for infiltration purpose.
- Elementalist (or psi for dune or anything like that) : for people who love to play with magic stuff even if they are in a futurist world
and much other classes, i didn't really think about that so far.
9 : Travel
This is a point where a lot of games suck, we would need here to have a large variety of different vehicles, from the quad to flying aircrafts (like in AO), some would have weapons, some wouldn't, and the pilot would have access to very good vehicles with a lot of weapons and all.
A grid transportation could be as well envisaged, this was a nice concept in AO
10 : skills
Skills could be class related, but also some other skills could be learnt by people (like vehicle control, craft, or stuff like that), Eve's skill system is nice imo, since u start from scratch and u can build ur char as u want, it just takes time, but in that case there's no class system, so i think there should be a balance between class oriented characters and skills common to everyone (with some special skills unlockable in the game)
11 : PVP
The pvp could be in any zone that allows it (a lil like the mitigation zones in AO), and the zones where guild cities would be possible would be open to war, and other realm members could sabotage guild cities facilities, slowing the production of other realm guilds.
The "inter realm" zones controlled by forts, would allow guilds to set up outposts that would be very incentive (access to special resources, faster r&d, ....), would bring points to the guild, and the zone's control would allow the controlling realm to enter special dungeons, with special bosses.
Each fort could be taken by a different faction every week (or something like that), and when a fort is taken, the different guild outposts would be open to attack as well for a certain period of time, this would allow the conquering realm to claim spots for its own guilds.
Also there would be special skills/items/race mutation available for people based on their pvp results.
Pvp should give points only when killing characters of a lvl close to urs (ie no reward for killing 'grey noob')
12 : Death and item decay
The best system for death i think is the 'clone system' like AO, SWG, EVE, whatever, when u die, u just activate a clone, and if ur clone is recorded with ur current xp/hp/lvl, u don't loose anything, if the clone is old tho then u loose the difference between ur clone and ur actual char. Cloning could be done for free at cloning facilities, or for a charge at range.
Items should decay but could be repaired by different 'offers' :
Max time/money : item repaired to 100% condition, would take the most time n money
Max time or max money : item repaired to 90% condition
and stuff like that. This would allow people to leave out their item for repair, wait some time and then get it back repaired without paying, or paying some to not have any delay.
13 : World Design
I think L2's char designer would be the best, or a korean/japanese art team, because they are by far, imo, the most skilled graphists to give a good style to a game.
14 : char customization
This is important to have a char that u like, so SWG/EQ2 and stuff like that char customization seems the best, with 2 mandatory things :
- Cloth simulation (cuz cloth and hairs in swg seem glued to the character, bad, very bad)
- Whole bunch of accessories and cloths (like in AO)
Also vehicles, houses, and stuff could be customizable and furnished at will (like in SWG)
Well theses are the thoughts i had when i couldn't sleep
this might be a lil messed up, but i think this would make a nice game.
You're a Hardcore Survivor!
You not only survived the zombie apocalypse, but did it with style! Your mastery of zombie knowledge, survival tactics, and weaponry is nearly unmatched. Congratulations, for you are hardcore!
My idea of the ultimate mmorpg!
For years i have always wanted an earth sim starting in the stone age with a few families of cave men
the rpg is about your family and its future but you control one char at a time , they age and die off so you start crafting and molding a new char after only a short time.
The world eveolves with weather , natural disasters and what not. while it populates more and more resources and technology becomes available to you .
Here would be a ty[ical example of a family:
The jetsons came from south america where they built seafaring vessels after goerge the 3rd died his son moved to north america and became a cowboy his son then formed a crime syndicate and so on
with professions ranging from mechanic to horse trainer to politics every profession you could imagine even farming.
of course there would have to be a limit on server max and there would be tons of servers just very small servers
You could be a bar owner or a pirate or just about any thing immaginable
like in most mmorpgs it loses its thrill after a few months and you think hmm ill make a new char to keep it interesting so you end up with 4 chars and non are uber ....in this mmorpg once your main char ages and dies you start fresh as a young new char free to do whatever you like
and the fact that history can be changed is really wierd say the american indians actually kept there country and ruled north america ...well that could happen in this game or the germans actually one ww2
thats were the fantasy part comesin to play
just my thoughts lol
All his points are valid, just some minor disagreements and additions.
Player housing is fine if you can find a way for it appear "alive". SWG had ghost towns littering the landscape, giving the appearance that the game was dead...while the main cities were huge, sprawling expanses of empty buildings with an inn or bank thrown in occasionally. Solution? Cheap apartments in town, very expensive houses out in the wilds. Would make the cities look "lived in" and control the number of empty houses littering the landscape.
Quests and mob UI...something needs to be done to make them change at random or monthly ...ANYTHING to negate the fan site spoilers. Devs come up with excellent encounters with challengese that are only challenging until the spoilers come out....this makes the player base breeze through content that should have taken much longer to master...with the dev team having to resort to PvP "sandboxes" in order to attempt to keep up with the player need for content.
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I believe that all players should feel powerful.
This can be little things like running fast. Of course the mobs would run just as fast, but look at CoH...you instantly felt powerful by running fast and leaping over everything....instant fun...sadly the game lacked any semblance of depth so players tired of it quickly.
Big guilds and raids and LFG. Get rid of the concept. Throw it awy. It only results in limiting the life of the game. I was in a top guild for 5 years in EQ, so I know the advantages a big guild has, but the big guilds with the ubar equipement results in 90% of the players feeling wimpy very quickly. It results in new players being reluctant to even start because they are so far "behind"...thus natural attrition is not countered by enough influx of new players.
All players feeling powerful and in control of their fun means the loss of power by a select few, such as guildleaders or "needed" classes. One wonderful result of "battlegrounds" showing up in games is that players don't have to LFG to play. I believe much of the class struggle and class envy and cries for solo content would be eliminated if there was NO PvP except in RvR and/or battlegrounds, with no 1v1 or even dueling. Yes, eliminate dueling too since it promotes the class envy and the flavor of the month classes. Get rid of anything that harms the cooperative, congenial play such as was seen in early EQ before the epic weapons made huge raiding guilds a necessity to get "your epic", people picked guilds for friendships, not because of what a guild could do for them, you didn't care what another class had, you chose a class for what "fit", not what would get you in a group.
Solo is not a 4 letter word.
Every single MMORG with a forum has hundreds of players begging for solo content, even after the early levels. It does not mean soloists should be playing single player games. Solo and late-game charactor advancement should not be mutually exclusive. It should be a viable option with excellent rewards...just make the solo content difficult and able to do in stages over a long period of time to justify comparable rewards to what a hardcore raiding guild gets...afterall only 1 to 5 of those people in a 50 man raid are even doing anything resembling challenging, the others are just there to follow orders and stay awake.
Take that concept one step further and make PvE either soloable or have the automatic grouping of anyone who wants in, is in....with encounters adjusting accordingly. Sure, still have grouping and raiding but have it as a choice...not as the only way to have fun or advance your charactor.
Overall, take the permanant advantage of "hardcore" players (I've been one) out of the picture...sure let them attain the good stuff quicker but not have the ubar items only attainable by 50 people doing a dungeon over and over at 5 hours a streatch. ...then the next dungeon is geared for the hardcore guild with the phat loot and is more out of the reach of the normal player...and it goes on and on, until the devs are essentially programing for a couple megaguilds on each server...with the rest feeling like wimps.
Oops gotta get ready for work, grats to anyone who actually read all this.
EDIT--as a side note, I believe that the next generation successful MMORG should have extensive use of voice overs for NPCs..some have starting using them, but no one has made them an intregal part of their game to the extent that NPCs have definite personalities and lots of varience. This will add a lot to making the game more immersive. I expect more in game use of player use of voice (as a designed part of the game) to eliminate the constant typing and reading, where a player actually talks to an NPC and gets a response.
i agree with all his points however as he mentioned he did overlook some points, one being GAME CONTENT!
i dont think any game can servive without good game content. Everquest probably had the most content of any mmo out there, one could play for 6 years and Still be getting lvls and AA's and loads of new gear, there was really no end.
WoW suffers in this area considering it has a mere 5 high lvl instances with 1 more on the way. also considering that there instances breaks them down even more, wheres the competition to get to that zone first between guilds. that also creats a relativly EASY game, where as i walk into ironforge and everyone is wearing the same armour sets.
Every game needs in depth low end and high end content to make it so players ALWAYS have new things to do after maxing out there lvl.
Some points:
First I think there is something far worse than the combat then just the autoattack button and the special skill light ups in most everygame today. That is the simple fact that devs have decided we are no better than a hamster in an exercise wheel. Yay I just started the game so I get to go kill rats. OOO Im level 2.. where is the slightly larger rat? WOOHOO DING! I made level 60/100/500/10million where is the gargantuan rat of blight and decay at? Combat in general is not only boring but so is the meaningless nature of the slaughter. I'm sorry you put a big bad mother of all demons in a game and my party kills that (insert term for female dog here) then there should be a decrease in the population of demons. But instead while you are sitting their healing resing or regenerating the witch returns like nothing happened.
Secondly and most importantly in my eyes was something that SWG did pretty much exclusively. Too bad with the recent publishes have gone out of their way to hurt these roles rather than help them. This is the noncombat classes. Something that is built for the roleplayers. In swg they have the entertainers. One of my fondest memories of swg was meeting people in the cantina, becoming friends and the 5 of us (a wookiee musician/bh (myself) a human master musician/smuggler (qody) and 3 master entertainer/dancers (1 human 2 twi'leks)) traveled from npc city to npc city (this was before player cities) as a troupe performing far and wide. We then started choreographing dances to music, specific dance flourishes to different waves within the music, and even wrote songs that our characters sang. An Eopie with No Name is one of my favorites from then. We were hired by guilds to perform weddings, perform at parties, everything and it was a BLAST. Not once did we ever have to pick up a weapon and kill a rat.
There are no other games, that I am aware of, that embraced the rolplayer like SWG did prior to the release of WoW. Unfortunately the SWG dev team is tryign to oversimplify what was so strong and good with their game to cater to the twitch gamer. And swg is starting to slide from mmorpg to mmoag (mmo Action Game). Embrace us. Embrace the roleplayer. Did Richard Garriott become the successful man he is today by goign for mass market appeal? Or did he cater to the niche market who's fans are loyal intelligent or creative.
Allow us to choose our roles and give us the means to play those roles. ONLY then will you have succeeded in making an MMORPG rather than an action game with the basest of elements common to an rpg. Stats and skills alone does not an rpg make.
http://www.speedtest.net/result/7300033012
I think I may have posted here before (8 pages whoo) but after playing a bit of Shadowbane, my opinion on the matter has changed anyway, so.......
Everything that the character does should be heavily tilted towards player skill: combat, crafting, whatever. I used to think it should be balanced, but the reason for the change of mind is two-fold. One, I've played enough point-click-wait games (and so has everyone who plays) that I will seriously vomit if I have to play another. Two: WHAT THE #$%&* do you think fighting is?? Games are meant to be engaging. If people in SB can plant their character next to a monster spawning point and LEAVE THEIR COMPUTER.. then something is really broke. The FPS idea is really a good one IF it is implimented correctly.
Keep in mind that the phrase ROLE-PLAYING isn't just accidentally there. I'm not talking about speaking ol' english and removing conjuctions from your speech, but come on, people. You're PLAYING A ROLE. If you're playing a fighter, you should expect a lot of twitch, because that's what being a fighter is; hopping around trying to hurt others while you don't get hurt. If you LIKE click-wait, then what the $#* do you WANT to play a fighter for?
So I put you off being a fighter so Waa, you cry, what else is there? If you're playing SB, then the tragic answer is... not much which more than anything else in SB makes it a crappy game. Whoever thought up the idea of unrestricted warfare (on a potentially grand scale) and forgot the simple fact that no matter who the combatants are they have legions of crafters on the payroll was a true idiot. If you don't have an economic infrastructure, then what the #$%* are you fighting for? And if you HAVE and economic infrastructure, why can't the players be involved in it. Speaking of crafters?? something more interesting than click on ingredients and then click 'make' please... Jes*s F**k*ng CH**ST!
Usually the answer for why the players aren't involved in the economy comes down to "The devs are scared the players won't do what they want." To which I say "Cry me a river. Shut up and provide what you promise." If you build a good system, then no matter what the players come up with, it will stabilize itself. If you don't build a good system, chances are you'll f**k up a bunch of other things, so just don't bother.
I still agree that characters should be 100% customizable in terms of what skills they can take and what kind of 'profession' they can play. Race might make 'suggestions' Maybe dwarves have penalties if your a mage and elves have bonuses, but they should be slight and not deciding factors. Classes and levels are an archaic hold over from so long ago, most devs probably don't know where it came from, just that everyone's doing it. It doesn't work, it causes more problems than is solves so stop it already.
At game launch at least, the world should be almost completely unpopulated by NPCs. A few NPC cities for newbie protection based on faction affiliation and that's it. That being said, NO QUEST SYSTEM. I know I'll catch a lot of flack for this, but I'll say it again: NO QUEST SYSTEM. The best quests are player initiated and player driven. To that end, the NPC's must be dynamic. They should migrate, hunt, defend their territory, etc. The explanation I read for how NPCs were to be handled in Darkfall was the best I've seen. Mobs spawn all over, a teeny bit at a time. The places close to the cities, the players will eradicate or utilize. The ones in the far corners will grow. When the NPC population reaches a certain point, they form camps, villages, towns and eventually cities. These can be benevolent or bad guys. At each higher stage, more powerful NPCs are spawned and more of the lesser ones and also commanders are spawned who will actually take control of groups of NPCs and move around with them. These NPC groups can go hunt their enemies, trade with friendlies and even settle other areas. If you have a good system like that and a good economic system, then quests take care of themselves. There will always be something for you to do, and someone willing to pay you to do it. This was also a failing of SB. The mobs never moved and never changed their difficulty. You always knew where to find them and so did your enemies and all the griefers in the game. You knew how far away you had to be so they wouldn't attack you. Just once, I want a game where the NPCs could decide your city was undefended and to take you out. Of course that would mean you had to defend your city 24/7. That's where NPC defenders came in, but SB didn't go far enough and allow NPCs with players on the offensive or (and here's the interesting bit) players JOINING NPCs already on the offensive.
Yeah, I know some people are going to say "Well you can't be expected to be online all the time." To which I respond "You don't have to be online ALL the time, but if you expect to do something as grand as rule a city, you better be prepared to be online as often as it does take." Anything else (SB and UO come to mind) allows real estate to be snapped up and kept WAY too much and suddenly there isn't enough room to put anything else.
There's a lot more... but basically that's it. Customizing your characters look is important I guess, but I see it the same as graphics and sound. It can add a lot to an already good game, but until you get the mechanics down right, don't even try to bother me with how the game looks or sounds or how cool your toon might look.
I agree with everything that you say in the article. I dont like alot of what todays mmo's are doing with the gay leveling system...Yup Thats right GAY whoever keeps using this later in mmorpgs should be shot.
About the necron 2 thing where you can aim your weapon, i think this is an awesome concept and i think in fantasy genre games they should use this when it comes to ranged weapons such as bows and javalins and stuff. I would get so addicted to a game where i control where im shooting without actually just targeting and waiting.
Also I want to be able to enhance my skill with a weapon instead of enhancing my skill with just me just like in necron 2.
"Oh let me kill this rat, and i will gain experience and this will make me better at life."
Developers...Please do something different next time around
Next Generation of mmorpg's my @$$! heheh ignore that ive been playing Coh for hours. god damn hypocrite
play:LoTRO status: dragging
tried: WAR, FFiX, WoW, Guildwars, Silkroad, Vanguard, AoC, Sword of the New World
Ok here goes nothing
The perfect game obviously incorporates all aspects of every MMORPG out there. Here is my idea I had a long time ago
I am a Shadowbane player and even though that game has its troubles, it has to be the best PvP game on the market with asset loss and a free for all PvP feel. Not everyone likes PvP so my idea revolves around a few games tied together.
1) You start out on a Leveling island that is full of quests and instances. You can create a guild or solo (DAOC Style) for your levels. You do not leave this island until your max levels. This will take away from the ever so annoying Lobie gankers. IMO there is NO place for this, its just stupid.
2) Now that your character is leveled, its time to make a choice on what direction your high level game experience wants to go.
Choice 1) Free for all world (shadowbane style). Here you can create player cities, set sieges and fight over land ,resources, keeps etc. There are a lot of ways to make this very interesting. The politics are key in this world by making allies and enemies. In this world there will also be available guild quests that help you acquire items for the good of your Nation. The big difference is while on a quest in these lands, you are fair game for PvP. If you complete a quest you get large rewards. This takes away from the HOURS and HOURS of farming needed in other games. The farming will still be available if you wish to solo for extra gold and items but the main focus is teamwork in the quests. There is a lot more that can go into the world that can be discussed and refined.
Choice 2) Enter the world of the High end Instances and Quests. (EQ Style). While still being able to own your own guild city, no PvP will be available here. You main goal is to complete High-level raids to unlock harder and more interesting adventures. This zone also will have single adventurer quests and instances if someone just wants to play alone. They can also build a modest cottage in the world as well. Again a lot of ideas can enhance this idea.
After your character creation you will have your abilities and basic items needed to enter each world. At this time you will need to pick a profession. Blacksmith, Alchemist etc. Now you can start to create items for yourself or sell at an auction (WoW) The auction is an awesome thing, you place the items on an auctioneer and if it sells you get your gold. You do not have to stand around for hours yelling I have items for sale. Also the Mailbox (WoW) was another awesome idea, just simply mail items to friends even if they are not online.
Travel is always a pain on MMORPGs. I think if you combine a few ideas together it makes for a better experience.
Cities that are in the same nation can inter travel through portals (DAOC)
A) Everyone can buy a mount for faster travel (WoW,DAOC)
C) Generic locations with flying creatures available or rune gates (WoW, Shadowbane)
D) Character Summoners. (Shadowbane)
Really, spending hours running around looking for a fight or to get to a city the quest sends you to really isnt pleasant. Make travel a lot easier.
With all this being said, there are a lot more things in my mind but this would turn into a book. Anyway, hope you all agree and hope someone takes these ideas and develops a new adventure MMORPG that everyone will enjoy.
P.S. As for the leveling, make it fast. Nothing worse then spending 2 months questing and being only ½ way done your toon (WoW,EQ)