f13.net

Not resurrecting the old (2 years ago) thread.

http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=19796

Gamasutra ran an article and if I'm reading it right, they're looking more at a Guild Wars style game than a raw open mmog. I suppose we'll see though. I've heard nothing but good things about what they're doing though.

I read the article and didn't quite get the Guild Wars thing - if anything, it sounds like they want to have minimal instancing and just a lot of open world content that can be different objectives per person.

Very pie in the sky type stuff, but it'll be neat if they can pull it off.

They can't pull it off really, that's the point. No one is going to accept that one person can do X and then someone else can't. The end result, imo, is that they'll have open world areas, maybe full world events, but there will be storyline specific stuff you can do in shared (raid or otherwise) spaces.

I also liked how much they seem to be focusing on community. Also, though, more pie in the sky stuff.

I don't think it's going to be like Guild Wars at all.  


This is the key.  While they'll use some instancing, most of what they're talking about will occur in the actual game world.  

I believe this concept is probably the next big step in the evolution of MMOs.  Lots of people talk about it and want it, but actually doing it, in a way that's fun and interesting is the (very) tricky part.  

I don't think the tech for that is there yet. I'd really like to think so, but I still think they'll reserve major storyline bits for instances. Despite what it says, everyone on this entire site knows to throttle back anything that comes out of a developers mouth.

Yea, sure, maybe the next step in evolution. But are we there yet? While I'd like to think so, I don't think so.

We aren't there yet, but I think MMO tech is just far enough along that people can develop the rest of the tech needed to make it work. 


I think the key may be just that.  Let's say there's "Rat Lord Fred" who drops the "Dagger of Fine Slicing".  You want to kill him and get the dagger.  In most games, this means go to the one static spot he appears at, kill him, and get the loot.

What if instead you were able to indicate to the game that "Rat Lord Fred" was what you wanted to kill, and it generated an adventure which finished in finding him somewhere, and killing him?  Sometimes it might lead you up into the mountains, to the ruins of an old keep with giant rats, and other times it might lead you through the swamp to a heavily ruined city where Fred (along witih swarms of small rats) is inside the sewers underneath it.

Two players can kill Fred and get the dagger (everyone can do X, where X is kill Fred for a dagger) but they are significantly different experiences along the way.  Could you accept the fact that you had to go up into the mountains to the keep to kill Fred, while your friend had to go into the swamp to kill Fred, as long as the difficulty between the two was basically the same?  You did both get the dagger.

Uh. How is moving the quest objective resulting in a unique experience? That doesn't make sense. Might as well have two quests with double the content. All that does is make it harder for curse.com to track your game. And it makes it impossible for a tie-in to a strategy guide.

This was going to be one of the core premises in Microsoft's Mythica. Event-based outdoor procedural content type thing. ]

What makes it very hard to do these days is the reliance on pre-scripted content. Nobody seems willing to allow NPCs to even go to bed anymore, much less die even temporarily. They're afraid someone's going to complain when in reality all this does is perpetuate the play-by-cheatsite mentality. It's a self-fulfilling prophesy. If there's only one way to play a game, it will get documented so it can be done so more efficiently.

If all of the NPC conversations and quests were based on formula though, you could make adjustments to the world that would simply require players think differently. We did it in UO with procedural events that were created when we read News Postings at Empath Abbey. We did it again in SWG with the Mission Terminals. Both were grind mechanisms of course, but the theory was sound. And all but required in a world where players could build what they wanted where they wanted. Can't spawn a lair in a house (though of course they did sometimes :wink:)

These were not award-winning quests of course. But then, even canned quests don't rate there either. Scripted or procedural, they're all forgotten after completion anyway because knowing what the quest was about in no way impacts the reward received.

So it's not a bad thing to try. In fact, it could allow for deeper player decision making and more immersion in a storyline that's easier to release content for.

But you need the right company with enough money, time, talent and publisher relationship to pull it off. That we haven't seen yet. Until then, it's simply easier to run scripted content through an established pipeline to deliver a game to players who want to game a canned system.

I guess I didn't explain it well enough.  Darniaq says it well, and his final paragraph is exactly right. 

In part, it's the details that are important.  What I'm trying to describe is two completely different adventures that just share two common components at the end - killing the named NPC and getting the specific piece of loot.  Add in details that happen along the way (faction gains (and losses) with nearby NPC groups), elements (drops, dialog) that lead to other, related quests.

One of the important details is that it shouldn't be completely random.  People should be able to say, oh, if you want a good dagger, go kill this specific NPC, and then they'll be able to compare their accomplishments. 

Anyways, it sounds like Red 5 might be working on something like this.  I hope they are. :)

I don't know why they just don't combine the 2 halves of MMOs... crafting and adventuring.

Make crafting super complex... most crafters want that anyway. Have dozens of components for each craftable item. Then allow the Crafter to either get the components on their own, or create quests for adventurers.

Have components for Tier 2 items drop on Tier 1 mobs.
The crafter can then give Tier1 items as rewards for completing the quest.
Boss mobs could drop different gems or some-such that would increase quality.

Adventurers could put in orders for items, the crafter could then build them a quest to get the item.
The Crafter could put "Plot twists" into the quest he made, that would result in high quality items being returned to him... but would lower the chance of the adventurer being successful.

For epic quality items, the crafter could actually control the boss mob of another craft. Defeating that crafters heroes would give bonuses to his own projects and vice versa.

Entirely player driven quest system. no?

ATiTD meets WoW. First company that can do that well is teh winar! That is not an easy task though, considering the type of development and thinking that goes into such diametrically opposing experiences.

Yes, please.

Give me random.  Or anything that removes the static feel to current MMOs.  While I'm jaded and pessimistic at best, I do have that shining kernel of hope that I'll see something like it before I keel over and die.

I think that's why EQ1 did well... it had crap loads of quests... none of them were had any standard design. There were no real guide sites (not at first) and even when they did come along, again, there were no real standards when they designed the game so there was no way to know how the mob spawns worked. We all had theories that basically devolved down to superstition. It made the game seem a lot more "Wild"

Oh God, that reminded me of one of those horrible EQ1 experiences trying to get some magical boots at a lowish level (I wanted to kick ghosts, God knows why but it seemed important at the time). It involved getting the quest from a gnome guard, except most of the time he wasn't there. Occasionally he spawned in place of another guard but I don't recall there being any real regularity to it, nor was it very often. I think I spent about a week logging in and just standing around waiting for him to spawn. After the excitement of finally getting the boots wore off I had pretty much lost interest and took about a month off.

In fairness that was my fault rather than the game but it seemed indicative of the EQ1 game play for items, camp and wait for the respawn.

Ghouls couldn't be hurt with normal weapons.  I found out the hard way.  Couple levels later I finally found one and went back hunting for revenge. 

Yeah I had magical weapons. There was just something about not being able to kick for damage that wounded my completist soul.

I see no reason why they would have to be diametrically opposing experiences.

If someone made an adventure game complete with killing mobs that drop loot, and incorporated a crafting system - that nobody HAD to participate in, unlike ATiTD... in other words, just the crafting system, not the legal system or political system or any of that crap - it'd be a winner.

ATiTD lacked adventure for me via killing mobs or players.  I couldn't stand the politics, but then I don't much care for guild drama either.  The crafting system was the best part - and finding things when exploring (but there was way too much nothing in between the things).

Believe me, it was. And it got worse. There were fuckers who camped one spot for a week straight (at the computer, logged in and waiting in one spot) for one drop on the cleric epic weapon quest. Fuckers were tripping ballz by the time the damn thing spawned.

Isn't this exactly what SWG was attempting to do?  A vibrant, player-based economy with some complexity to it coupled to essentially the classic diku model.  (Note: it couldn't be WoW because of the timing, but I'm using diku-model in place of WoW).

It's all in implementation.  Doing ATitD + WoW sounds a lot easier than it actually is, though I know that you know this.  You're far better versed on gaming than I could hope to be. 

How is this different from EVE as it works today?

Very similar to SWG as well.

At least it was before they replaced SWG with that other game. I have no idea how SWG crafting works today.

Eve isn't fun.

Mining dawg.  It's where the real action be at.

I will note that Charlie's design document does not contain the word "fun".

SWG wasn't a Diku originally (it was skill-based like UO), though it is now.

The Diku-model does not lend itself well to a player-based item/crafting system. It's no accident that the games with the best player-crafting systems (UO, SWG before it got destroyed, EVE) are/were all skill-based system.

If you had stuck around you would have found that every crafting system was contributing to political shitstorms, in one way or another. That's the core of ATITD really, and while it was fun playing with you, it's a good thing you left before the craziness began. :)

I remember the early days of UO, where I would be at work and be wondering what was going on with the world while I was away. Then I'd get home and read the news of the realm, and eagerly jump in to see what all had transpired. With our current crop of MMOs, nothing transpires while you're away. It sounds like Red 5 might be bringing some of that back, and I think that's part of the magic we've lost.

Yes. Which is why I said in my first reply:


 :grin:

It's Panacea, wishful thinking that any company is big or broad enough to be able to effectively combine both ATiTD-style crafting and diku playability/fun. In addition to the development processes requiring very different things, it cannot be ignored that ATiTD is an imperceptibly small percentage of the total MMO playerbase out there. Who can make that argument to their management/VC folks? "We want you to pay us buckets of cash so we can make a socioeconomic sim like the highly successful and profitable... what?"

Gonna clarify that a bit:

I think the biggest problem is financial will. Either you're making an epic you want to put onto a store shelf, or it's an indie digital download. The costs for making either one are very different because how much you make back is very different. Nobody's going to spend $80mil on a game they'll only be able to sell through Steam for example.

Related to that is player interest. Eve is the absolute biggest of these types of games, but that's like saying SL is the biggest of the custom virtual world toolsets. It's a very small pond when compared to the other that is hunter/combat/diku-inspired adventure games.

It's a double-edged sword. The games get fewer development and marketing dollars because their projected playerbase is small. Their playerbase is small because the games get fewer development and marketing dollars.

After all that, then we add in the expectation of a hunter/combat/diku-inspired game. They take a LOT of money, but they GET a lot of money. And it shows in the content and their playability. This too is a double edged sword.

To me it's little wonder that the crafting side of thing gets so little dev time. They looked at EQ and DAoC and fast forwarded to WoW. All big sellers in their own rights. None had anything approaching a "good" crafting system. Even EQ2 wimped out on this (though in this particular realm it's better than the others).

So, to inspire a developer to even try requires a certain type of developer we don't really have anymore.

It's a good direction to go in, but god help you if you fuck it up. For one, you can't use content served this way to cockblock progression. Then it really does become a structural obstacle that players will hate.

Contrast these three:

1) I log in. Let's see, what shall I do tonight? Listen to rumors in the tavern. Hey, they're talking about the vampiric dagger of Rat Lord Fred. This guy will give me a map for ten coppers. Fun, let's do that. [somewhat randomized adventure ensues, dagger acquired, fun results. Log off].

2) I log in. Let's see, I'm level 15, and I need to train up my new skill in dual-axe-wielding. I must find and defeat the Axe Mangler, who is wandering somewhere in the northern wilderness. [Much hunting ensues. Can't find him. Turns out he's been dead most of the time because three other players hunting him for the same reason found him first. Log off, no fun.]

3) I gather clues to a new adventure, but it's one of only three totally scripted variants of the same adventure, so I just look it up on a cheat site. Or the clues don't matter at all, actually. I remember in Asheron's Call 1 early on that people were often convinced that you had to gather clues or information about some of the new content in order to find it or access it, but what actually happened was that whenever the content went live, somebody already knew (probably from knowing a GM or developer) where the new place was and the information was spammed over chat within an hour or two, everything was essentially scripted. Don't have variant pathways unless you have variant outcomes, and don't have variation unless some aspect of it is meaningfully random or unpredictable. If there are clues or mysteries or riddles or unknowns, they've got to be generated by something other than a script fragment.

This is where your idea for combining the two types goes wrong.

There are ideas used by some DIKU MMOs which are good.  Those ideas are not inherent to DIKU.  That's the problem though.  Devs think the DIKU is the fun part, when it is really other mechanisms.  They're copying the wrong parts and not innovating the bits that really need to change.

The scripting isn't the problem, it's the attempt to make something individually relevant in a world of thousands of individuals, all (most) of whom want to be the most important individual in the story. You can't deliver that without segregating each of those individuals or groups into their own instances. The whole concept of questing in MMOG's is flawed, because the quests are written from the viewpoint of providing one person or group a meaningful, tailored experience - and you have too many wanting their own personalized experience.

Yeah, that too is a good point.

Really, if the content isn't scripted, and the game isn't 95% instanced, what has to develop dynamically is not the player but the world. When I go off to find Rat Lord Fred with some buddies, and we kill him, something needs to change. Maybe the Giant Rats that have been infesting the city sewers need to be far less common, opening up an opportunity for the Society of the Cat Herders to muscle in on their territory. If most of the players in a given area are regularly killing the minions of one faction, something needs to happen to faction balance, distribution, presence, and activity.

Anybody remember the old AD&D Against the Giants modules? One of the great things about them when I played them as a wee lad was that they gave the DM some suggestions about dynamic responses to player action--if, for example, the players retreated out of the Hill Giant Steading to recoup and recover and came back two days later, the giants could have new guard posts, traps, and so on. What a real next-generation MMOG with dynamic content needs to do is scale that up and massify it, so it's not about your individual adventure, but about the collective impact that players as a whole are having on the world.

If this is just about "there are four scripts for the same adventure that has the same player-progression outcomes and it's a random draw which one you get", big fucking deal.

We (the royal "we" of MMOG players) fear change.  :grin:

When dynamic spawns are brought up, one argument against them is "Oh but it'll just get meta-gamed so we shouldn't even develop it." This isn't a good reason to avoid dynamic spawns, because honestly, meta-gaming happens at all levels. Players like meta-gaming. I'd argue that dynamic spawns should be developed specifically to give players something to meta-game.

In the hill giant example, say there are 1000 hill giants in the world, all evenly distributed. If the players assault and retreat from the Hill Giant steading, the giants fortify it...with giants from other areas. Suddenly the other hill giant camps are weakened.

The players go "Hey if we control those other camps, we can keep the steading weak!" I guess this is seen as a bad idea or something, when it actually sounds like fun to me.

I think it's more the "In UO we had monster spawns be finite, and everything was dead in a week's time."

Because we all know MMOG design really hasn't much progressed past the UO stage anyway.

Yeah, exactly: meta-gaming is about knowledge of the world. As long as the cause-and-effect relationship of things is sufficiently complex, and sometimes has unpredictable results, it's a way more compelling level to be pulling to get your little bit of fun for the night.

Of all the many things that get said about what didn't work in early UO, the argument that you can't have dynamic spawns because the world got emptied too fast is the single most annoying claim. It's a function of the size of the fucking world + location that create player density + location and rate of spawning nodes. If I placed a refugee camp of 10,000 human beings in an oasis in the middle of the desert with only enough date palms to feed 500 people/day and enough water for 1,000 people/day to drink, everyone would die very fast. Does this mean, "Never create population density of any kind in the real world"? Make a big world, spread people out (while giving them means to bridge distance quickly in order to group up for social and economic purposes), and make the time cycle of spawning appropriate to the size of the population and the world. That's all you need as far as this aspect of the problem goes.

Not my idea. I just picked the same two headliners we've been talking about for nine years  :grin:

Anyone can solve the problem. It just takes the things in combination that very few actually have. Because of what Khaldun said:

"what has to develop dynamically is not the player but the world."

How many studios even think along these lines? It's a competency that's been beaten down by market forces. Either the studio doesn't think along these lines or they're not permitted to by the publishing side.

None of what I've said says these are bad ideas. And none of this means it ain't ever going to happen. But what will make it happen is a surprise indie-hit that gets huge enough to melt servers, or a company enlightened enough to realize it's enough of a competitive advantage to put serious money (and therefore talent and resources) behind it.

What the game is at that point becomes interesting.

Yeah, I think it's going to take a relatively simple design in graphical terms and other terms that nevertheless implements a dynamic world to demonstrate just how appealing people might find it.

While I am all for dynamic worlds, I don't think it has to go that far.

I'm mearly commenting that equating diku with fun is one thing holding people back from getting out of the "this is the way it's done" mindset.  A diku could still have a dynamic world.  They're different mechanics not needing to be dependent upon one another.  We're convinced that ding! has to be ranking_number++ instead of any of many different rewards which players could find enjoyable.

Diku has its upsides for developers in that they can create guided content and balance it to that range.  It has its downsides in restricting players to that area, and if there is a lack of content or your balance sucks, the game suffers horribly (see AoC, et al).

I always thought that the answer to complaints about EQ1's static spawn camping was to have that mob linked to a repeatable quest. So if group X wants a shot at the shiny shoes, they go get the quest then go into the world to whack the fozzle and take his shoes.
That way everyone gets a shot at the shiny shoes, instead of just the catasses.

Now, WoW put that into instancing and ran with it in the creation of these scripted theme park dungeons. And while I do like how they've implemented it, I also miss simulationist games like UO and SWG where shit happened in the "real world".

This is exactly the sort of adventure I'm talking about / want to see.  In the right world, the map can lead you through a mix of instanced and non-instanced spaces, making sure there's a Rat Lord Fred for you to kill at the end.


There's the first, obvious approach of putting Axe Mangler in a instance only you can get to, to solve the problem, but I think we can do even better than that.  Have something happen that encourages the three other players to all join up with you, and then have the four of you fight Axe Mangler together. 


Yeah, this is the random, but not unique scenario we should avoid.  Even if you have a bunch of options, it's probably not enough.  Anyone remember treasure maps in UO?  I (vaguely) remember the out of game / cheat site maps people would make, showing the location of every buried treasure a map might possibly lead you to.


It might not be necessary, but it's good path to take.  If only my weekends and evenings were longer. :)

One implementation detail question for you all:  How would you feel about having the game ask you how long you want to play, when you login and/or enter story mode?  If you're going after Axe Mangler, and you've joined up with the three others looking for him, you don't want to be in a situation where you have to leave 30 minutes before the group is going to get to him.  If you don't mind it asking, would you prefer it to be out of character and precise (I want to play for 3 hours & 45 minutes, on a UI screen), or in character and more broad (when asking for rumors at the tavern, the barkeep asks if you're willing to take a short (15 minute to 45 minute), medium (1 hour to 3 hours) or long (4 to 6 hour) journey). 

 

I think that's a real sticky question. I'm sure we've all had a night where we wanted to do X activity, and some guildies had to bail due to RL. I think putting time constraints and an expectation that the character will be logged in (30 minutes, 2 hours, etc...) for a specific time would make me feel constrained.
 It possibly might make me not want to commit to any activities like that, and play at my own pace instead by seeking alternate things to do.

Conversely, there are times (I at least) log in the evening with only the intention of wrapping up some niggling thing I forgot to do, 30 minutes at most, and the next thing I know it's 4 hours later.  When something is fun, the tendency is to keep doing it unless a more pressing concern arises. (For example, work.  Or for the less misanthropic of us, sex.)

Our desired / expected / realistic time-frames when it comes to playing and fun are often completely disparate.  To predetermine a time-frame seems to imply that success is guaranteed (barring any colossal fuckup), which equates to a lack of challenge (unless not colossally fucking up is a challenge for you).  Add in the factor of group play, you now deal with several paradigms of game play vs. real life, and it's not rocket science to know how much of a variable other people are.  From the RL emergency causing your party members to leave, to sitting 3 hours LFG, how much you want to play and how much you need to play are often drastically different.

Unless your challenge levels adjust according to your forces.  But then why group to begin with if you can just solo it?

Presentation would be important.  I'm not quite sure of the ideal wording.  Players needing to leave early seems like one of the biggest obstacles to such a system and asking how long seems like easy, but perhaps too constraining solution.  For the people remaining, it's not a horrible problem - you could try to match up another player, and if that fails, bring in an NPC character.  I'm more concerned about the player logging out.  If he's always getting long stories and leaving at the beginning, it's going to get frustrating.  (Of course, then the game could notice that and start giving shorter events instead, perhaps looking at a playtime history?)

Very true.  Perhaps it would be completely optional.  Use historical data to set a guess as to how long they're going to play, and perhaps provide a window where they can enter something else, if they know it's going to be a non-typical play session?

For the default level of content, yes I think that would probably be the case.  There's a fine line of too easy to avoid, but success usually is guaranteed if you're doing "level appropriate" content, isn't it?  There's a few ways this could be handled.  If you're going after a well known target, he'd always be at a constant level of power, and if you don't bring enough power, you'd simply fail.  Challenge could also be another factor you indicate on a suggested playtime UI.

Yeah, but then it's perceived as forced grouping, and that's no fun.


Interesting. It could be exploited, as I would be sorely tempted to assign the shortest time possible to every quest, and just plow through the content. Of course, the rewards could be greater if you choose longer quests, but that could result in the players with the most time getting the best stuff. Unless...you could interrupt and resume your quest at any time. Say I took a 4-6 hour quest, and played it for one hour a night. It might take me all week, but I'd get it done in my own time.

That might defeat the purpose of it though, since it seems you're talking about 4-6 hours in one session.

It seems to me that what you're shooting for is something where the content isn't the hurdle you jump for progression, but progression is only the impetus or structure for serving content, where you're actually excited to go find the Axe Mangler because who knows what will happen when you do. If you succeeded in that objective, then grouping up with a bunch of strangers might not be all that satisfying, and would just take you back to the understanding that the mission is just another round on the treadmill.

Too bad the Axe Mangler couldn't be another real person with their own missions and objectives offered by the game that are somehow counter to your own, causing you to have a conflict not attached to a war that has no significance to the world.

Oh wait, it could, but no one is bothering to do that.

 I wonder how it would work out in practice, I think population levels would be a real problem especially a couple months after launch when most of the population has moved on to the late game/end game content.  Also cross teaming to exploit the mechanic would probably be a huge problem.  I like the idea, I just don't expect any of the mainstream developers to do it when it's safer to just make a WoW like game with a slight twist and I don't think a small indie team would have the resources to release anything worth paying to play.

What if Axe Mangler is never online when you're ready to finish your quest? (etc... etc... other people suck, etc...)

Maybe then the quest isn't available.

That could lead to people saying "Looking for someone to start the Defend Mangler quest so I can start the Attack Mangler quest!" And all of a sudden the PvP is not only meaningful, personal, and immersive, but it's also consensual! That's like getting xp and loot for dueling, and you get a story out of it too, additional objective, holy crap! Meta-gaming is looking better and better all the time.

I'm a big fan of the concept of procedurally generated missions. But so far we've either had semi-ok scripted content as part of large story arcs, or we've had UO-Posts/SWGandAO-Mission Terminals. Quite a spread there. It really does require a special type of programming and production competency to bridge that gap.


I think this is an important question. I have no idea what research has been done on this, but I always get the impression that the most successful games that really capture players are because they come to it with an impression that is so very different from the result:

"Oh, I'll just log in and do a quick Daily/turn-in"
"Wtf? 3am?!"

This correlates a bit with casual online games. People really do not expect to play World Mosaics for two hours. I mean heck, each puzzle takes a minute at most to complete. But you forget the time when you play it.

Maybe I'm unique, though I doubt it. I'm pretty vanilla yogurt as a person  :grin:

The quest would be generated based on who IS online.

Hell the MUD I worked on did this, back in like 1994. Shady NPC lurks around tavern, sells you a map, little themed area is generated somewhere out in the world, follow map to area, have a little 2 room adventure, collect loots. It was very popular, if a bit bare bones in modern terms.

CoX does this (nearly) with newspaper missions already too, come to think about it.

I fuckin' LOVED those treasure maps. I spent an embarrassing amount of time doing those.

Are the newspaper missions leading you to conflict with other players?

Nope. Basically it's mission objective, bad guy type, instance starts nearby, slightly personalised.

Nice first step, needs more cowbell.

What you talk about does sort of exist in the PVP battleground zones. I don't remember the exact details of it, but you could go to an NPC and he'd offer you a little quest to go kill a specific player in the zone from the other team, with some minor reward for doing so. I remember doing it on my blaster a few times, was a neat little feature.