Howdy, Stranger!
It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!
Quick Links
Pathfinder: The last hope for fantasy MMO's
JimmyYO
Member UncommonPosts: 519
We've all seen the direction games are taking. Instant gratification. Developer driven. 12 and under welcome. Take your pick but the genre is taking a fall and Pathfinder could likely be the last true RPGMMO before every developer completely gives over to the WoW mentallity. If you've spent anytime playing or at least watching Neverwinter you'll have discovered how shallow and pointless this themepark D&D game will be.
Lets hope Pathfinder does it right. I have faith given Paizo was made by gamers for gamers and they have actually made many decisions that benefit their players far more then their quarterly statement. Hopefully they stay true to that and see more then $$. I also hope this game releases as pay to play because free to play is just an illusion where you pay for toys instead of the actual game. Which is where the development turns resulting in a crapshoot of a game over time.
Pathfinder, I don't care if you have SNES graphics as long as you're immersive and true to the pnp whenever feasible.
Comments
u re not alone bro, from what im seeing, PFO is the last bastion of light for the genre for the time being. having saying that the business model is stated as hybrid tiered subscription/ "a la carte", im a lot worried about the " a la carte" (hope its not F2P).
we have to keep the fight on and the dream alive, support the freedom and break the mold.
I don't want to come off as hostile, but I doubt MMOs aren't doing so hot because they are fantasy. Champions Online or City of Heroes (whatever it's called) are both sci-fi and didn't make it. It seems like the failures lie in the actual games themselves (not enough content, bad community, repetition to 11)
I seriously doubt Pathfinder will be the last fantasy MMO. There's a few already still in the works. However, I am still looking forward to PFO as I really liked the sandbox aspects of Mabinogi.
Also, they've already gone and said it will be free2play on release, but the training requires paying real money for it or trading for it in game (similar to Eve's PLEX)
I am extremely interested in the game they are designing and the path they are taking to make it. This was the first project that I ever even considered joining a Kickstarter for (and I certainly did).
That said... it is NOT the last hope for fantasy MMOs. We should all know better than that by now.
All time classic MY NEW FAVORITE POST! (Keep laying those bricks)
"I should point out that no other company has shipped out a beta on a disc before this." - Official Mortal Online Lead Community Moderator
Proudly wearing the Harbinger badge since Dec 23, 2017.
Coined the phrase "Role-Playing a Development Team" January 2018
"Oddly Slap is the main reason I stay in these forums." - Mystichaze April 9th 2018
Yeah F2P sounds good on paper but most gamers seem to underestimate how much of an effect it has on developer priority. They can now release an even less finished game then usual and attempt to string you along with skins/effects/toys while never improving the actual game.
Imagine how depressing the pnp world would be if Pathfinder was never made and only 4e was out there. Woulda offed myself a long time ago. I've read very little about PO's actual plans but here's some things I'd like to see done:
-No instancing but a intelligent system in place to prevent 1 guild from ruling an entire server.
-As much pnp mechanics/rules/lore/feel that you can possibly pack in the game given your budget
-Learning from successful games in the CORRECT ways, such as WoW's network stability and smooth responsive controls.
-Balancing system requirements with graphics, the realism is in the immersion of the world not the graphics and nothing will kill your online game faster then stupid high system requirements. A hard lesson TESO is about to learn.
-Player driven economy, which is already in the works.
-Group based game, maybe 1 or 2 solo classes if that. Pnp adventures were never about solo and no exceptions should be made for the online version. Lets get the community working together again for the first time in 10+years. Make it very easy to get a group started though.
-Allow everything to be killable, including town guards, etc. Helps with immersion alot more then you'd think.
-Travel should feel like traveling but not like making you want to quit. Think classic EQ, not FFXI
Just off the top of my head.
I see litterally no hope in PFO, that it even might be different than all of the other games, and fully expect it to be yet another pittiful and insulting skinner box.
This is because the publisher Paizo, can't even be bothered to get it's own shit together for it's table top rules that it is basing it's game off of (Ever try to craft something? The rules are incomprehensable and contradicting in every resource to the point where the devs litterally gave up and that is just one example.) Rather than spend their own money on this prodject (the approritate symbol of commitment is monitary investment risk) they went straight to the players to ask for a hand out. This is basically free money they're alowed to piss away.
Now, I'm not blaming kickstarter because there is a lot of potential good in croud funding, but there is also the potential for a great deal of abuse, and because this is the standard that Paizo has set for itself it is reasonable to expect the result will be a shitty game filled to the brink with broken mechanics, class imballances, and apethetic Devs.
Just to be accurate: Goblin Works are developing Pathfinder Online (MMO) and Paizo produce the pathfiner PnP game (TT).
There's a break-down for the original kickstarter use of cash: A Busy Week for Goblinworks
The second one is for hiring devs and if you calculate about another 4-12 devs (min-max range) you can see where the cash ends up. What you're ignoring is raising capital investment in the current climate for a mmorpg that does not pitch "next wow roi" for a team of about 12 is really good going.
=
@OP: I think sci-fi generally has more potential than fantasy. It's the way we now perceive the world, especially "globalisation" it just makes the boundaries of our imagination stretch (or curve if you prefer!) beyond our planet and therefore it's shape that much more apparent. Instead of gods on mt. olympus we have cosmology and the laws of physics and mathematical language of nature. Also fantasy has been abused ad nauseum. That's not to say it's not the most popular and relatable genre, but most renditions are very lite. Fantasy done well requires some serious artistry.
On the subject of PFO (Pathfinder Online), the design sounds awesome but the implementation has a long way to go. Considering F2P, it as with all these pricing trends has it's own repercussions on the market just as a pure sub model standard did. Part of the fun is the journey and GW are doing a good job of that to date.
http://www.gdcvault.com/play/1014633/Classic-Game-Postmortem
Nothing is perfect. If they were to have it explain every loophole in the game, it would entail SEVERAL books (Imagining $300 JUST for core. No one would buy that, and even if it was free, no one would read several thousand pages just for a small aspect of the game.) That's why it's run by a human to make on the fly judgements. The crafting system is ENTIRELY OPTIONAL (many things in the PFRPG is optional.) They actually know what they are doing. LOTS and LOTS of people have fun with Pathfinder REGARDLESS of the flaws you point out (you don't hear it as much. I have yet to hear anyone out of 50+ people locally to say "Pathfinder is unbalanced." No one has said anything like that.)
They did spend some money (and their own resources.) Also, it isn't funded just by kickstarters: They actually have gotten some investors involved as well. The first kickstarter was for the tech demo (and to gauge interest), the second was to get it out faster (and I don't see who loses out on that.)
Please read up before you post. No offense, but it doesn't sound like you've read anything about the game at all. It's Goblinworks making the game, not Paizo. There is going to be similar mechanics, but this won't be a copy-paste of the PnP game because it doesn't scale well. It's not even about fighting monsters, it's going to be a lot similar to Eve.
Well, like most of the other people in this thread; I'm sure PFO is not the "last hope".
It's WAY too early to tell if it will even be any good. If they get everything they're aiming for, and they do it well; it will be a good MMORPG for the Open PVP gamers.
However, that also means it will most certainly NOT be d20 rules and it will NOT be the pen-n-paper Pathfinder game, online. It will be a good MMORPG that licenses the "Pathfinder" name.
Which is how they are advertising it - a sandbox MMORPG in a Pathfinder setting. They are very clear that most of the pen and paper rules will not make it into the online game.
Pathfinder: The last hope for fantasy MMO's
----------------------------------------------------------------
"No, there is another"
http://www.gdcvault.com/play/1014633/Classic-Game-Postmortem
If so, good.
The fantasy genre has been done to death in MMO by now.
Companies should try to make more sci-fi, crime vs law, supernatural or historical based mmos instead.
Wow, someone needs to take a break...
That Guild Wars 2 login screen knocked up my wife. Must be the second coming!
I love sci-fi games. But even this has limits.
Would love more games that didnt pick a predefined genere of lore and make their own unique game, setting, and perhaps birth a new genere of lore.
If no, sci-fi please. No pre-existing IP though...they always wreck the game when they do that...probably a mixture of forcing lore that doest fit, and forcing game mechanics to make the lore fit.
Bit of an academic discussion (although if it's 'academic', then by implication it's already an argument). Main thing is for mmorpgs to get over "everyone is a hero" imo. Any IP that serves that is serving the virtual environment.
http://www.gdcvault.com/play/1014633/Classic-Game-Postmortem
Your letting your issues with the PFRPG cloud your realizing what PFO is, or will be. Paizo doesn't dictate how PFO is being made, nor what content, systems are included. When the Devs have to deviate from the RPG's rules they consult Paizo, but that's the extent that Paizo is involved.
Goblin Works people come from studios with experience making all kinds of games, I doubt we will see broken mechanics and apathetic Devs. No need to worry about class imbalances because there will be no classes! Pathfinder will have a number of features that no game has tried to implement, a couple I only recall mention of in the "hoax of the year" Dawn, if anyone is old enough to remember that!
While I don't think Pathfinder is our last hope, It's one of the only games that interests me thats being developed now. Gear grubbing theme park games where "everybody always wins" hold absolutely no interest for me any longer. I'm ready for a game that doesn't hold your hand as it leads you down the yellow brick road.