Star Trek Online: Here We Go Again!

[NiX]

Way to give us a link.

[UnSub]

Here's a link to a link. Haven't watched it since I don't care who is doing the VO.

[Sir T]

Way to give us a link.

Oops

http://www.filefront.com/15196037/Star-Trek-Online-Leonard-Nimoy-Trailer/

[Triforcer]

Vids on Youtube of Klingon ship combat actually makes it look mildly fun.  The problem with ship combat is that you simply can never make it as varied as WoW-style fantasy ground combat.  You are fighting ships and maybe the occasional blob of amorphous energy with rays.  That's it, and its why Eve could never grab me for more than a couple days. 

It certainly looks tactical and all that but I think I'd get tired of max-room continual camera adjusting to find strafing enemies really fast. 

[Stabs]

I don't think ship combat is bad per se.

In the IP I thought the ship combat with Scotty panicking and Chekhov concentrating maniacally was much more fun than the land combat with Kirk jumping off a rock onto some lizardman.

In other gaming genres ship combat both in space and on sea has been done in very interesting ways. Pirates and Wing Commander are iconic games.

[eldaec]

Vids on Youtube of Klingon ship combat actually makes it look mildly fun.  The problem with ship combat is that you simply can never make it as varied as WoW-style fantasy ground combat.  You are fighting ships and maybe the occasional blob of amorphous energy with rays.  That's it, and its why Eve could never grab me for more than a couple days. 

It certainly looks tactical and all that but I think I'd get tired of max-room continual camera adjusting to find strafing enemies really fast. 

You mean that combat in a setting where you can have player avatars of any shape and size, which can reasonably be made to move at any vareity of speeds, and operate at any range, and where you can invent any class structure you like with any capabilities explained by [technobabble]; is inherently going to be less varied than fantasy_diku_742?

Are you smoking crack rocks?

What element of WoW combat would be even slightly awkward to replicate in space?

[Venkman]

It's not really that varied though. Tri's wrong about Eve combat, probably just never having gotten to the level where dozens of different people are doing dozens of different thinks all in a coordinated battle. But based on the videos for STO, I don't think he's wrong about this one.

It's not like you get to throw out tractor beams to make two fighter craft crash into each other, a Deflector gun on one Borg ship, phasers on two cruisers, quantum-torpedos on a Klingon, teleport a warp bomb* to the Jem'hadar command ship, expand your metaphasic shields to encompass a damaged ally within a star's corona, and beam an invasion force on the nearby Romulan cruiser.

By ST tech you could do all these things with the Enterprise-E, with power and shuttle craft to spare. But in STO, it looks like you've got beam weapons, projectile weapons, four quadrants of shields and duration buffs. Like PotBS basically, including all the ground game stuff. But at least not AA.

* To be clear: this is impossible according to Zephram Cochrane

[statisticalfool]

Vids on Youtube of Klingon ship combat actually makes it look mildly fun.  The problem with ship combat is that you simply can never make it as varied as WoW-style fantasy ground combat.  You are fighting ships and maybe the occasional blob of amorphous energy with rays.  That's it, and its why Eve could never grab me for more than a couple days. 

It certainly looks tactical and all that but I think I'd get tired of max-room continual camera adjusting to find strafing enemies really fast. 

You mean that combat in a setting where you can have player avatars of any shape and size, which can reasonably be made to move at any vareity of speeds, and operate at any range, and where you can invent any class structure you like with any capabilities explained by [technobabble]; is inherently going to be less varied than fantasy_diku_742?

Are you smoking crack rocks?

What element of WoW combat would be even slightly awkward to replicate in space?

Inertialess movement. The effect that change has on how you make a combat system fun is huge.

The setting definitely also puts pressure to restrict things to lasers and missiles (especially given that the dreaded weight of canon is all around), but that ships won't feel right without large amounts of inertia is the big deal. It totally changes what kind of games you can engage players in.

[Triforcer]

Yeah, fantasy ground combat (done well) is always going to be more varied than space combat.  Or at the very least, its going to LOOK more varied.  Fantasy ground combat is also easier to draw people in with than scifi ground combat.  

If I wasn't lazy, I'd write about why this is so.  But its a combination of what we've actually seen so far in each genre, the ease of suspension of disbelief in each genre (hint:  magic can do anything because its magic, but there are limits to what we can see tech do and be immersed), and art possibilities.

That doesn't mean a tech/space MMO can't be good, but the subject matter just isn't as well suited to the medium.  

[Venkman]

There is no inertia in ST tech unless a captain wants it. This is unlike SW tech. Eve is more of a hybrid.

I think you guys are confusing potential with experience. Outside of advanced Eve battles, there's no good space battle MMOs. But that doesn't mean space combat has some intrinsic disadvantage. It just means it has been done to its full potential. Like so many other things missing from this genre.

I find MMORPG diku fantasy battles rather boring. They're always the same. We're just used to them after a decade of conditioning, so we get disproportionately excited when anything is mixed up. Like Game A just having fireballs as DD and Game B have a fireball and a DoT. Oooh, shiny!

Sci-fi has as much potential to be interesting as fantasy. Just re-read my example above of what a ST battle could be. It's just that the latter has been far more defined in games, because of a stronger heritage of definition.

The only thing holding back Trek has always been the writers using tech as a plot device to tell the same boring ass contemporary drama story.

[Kail]

Yeah, fantasy ground combat (done well) is always going to be more varied than space combat.  Or at the very least, its going to LOOK more varied.  Fantasy ground combat is also easier to draw people in with than scifi ground combat.  

That's awfully general for me to swallow.  Sci-fi covers a lot of ground, everything from Robotech to Aliens to Xenosaga.  I don't see how it's possible that they'd be less varied than fantasy ground combat, and I don't see sci-fi in general having a lot of trouble pulling people in.  I mean, there have been one or two sci-fi space marine games that have pulled in a few players despite (I guess?) being less accessible than elves and gnomes.

Star Trek may be difficult to make look exciting, but then, I don't think many people were wet with anticipation over the idea of a combat-centric MMO being made out of an IP centered on character drama and Philosophy 101.

[Sheepherder]

Air battles in UT2004 work.  I also heard this game called Starcraft is popular.

[Triforcer]

Sigh.  I was obviously talking about MMOs- you know, those massively multiplayer games we pay sub fees for?

[Lantyssa]

Well, fantasy MMOs have shown us such flashy and irreproducable combat arts such as hitting things with a sword and bajillion particle effect death beams.  Even way out there concepts such as guns and personal deflector shields which could never work in a sci-fi setting.

[01101010]

Alright, fess up time. Who signed up for beta?

[Kageru]

After Champions online they would have to pay me to beta another game of theirs.

[Venkman]

Air battles in UT2004 work.  I also heard this game called Starcraft is popular.

There's nothing in Starcraft that couldn't be done with Orcs and Humans. It's not really a "space" game except for the skinning.

Air battles in UT2004 though, definitely.

[Sir T]

Star Trek may be difficult to make look exciting, but then, I don't think many people were wet with anticipation over the idea of a combat-centric MMO being made out of an IP centered on character drama and Philosophy 101.

One of the reason the later star trek movies failed is that they were pretty much mindless action flicks. If they had actually had a decent story and done with some style (such as in the actual show) they would have been better. Take a look at the Wrath of Khan. You felt every phaser hit, it meant something.

[Triforcer]

I'm hearing surprisingly good things from beta reviews.  But those are really bad at judging the amount of content for obvious reasons.  I've been burnt so many times, but I'm SURE this time I won't burn off my cheek when I mishandle the pipe.  

[UnSub]

Alright, fess up time. Who signed up for beta?

I did, but I sign up for a number of betas.

[01101010]

Star Trek may be difficult to make look exciting, but then, I don't think many people were wet with anticipation over the idea of a combat-centric MMO being made out of an IP centered on character drama and Philosophy 101.

One of the reason the later star trek movies failed is that they were pretty much mindless action flicks. If they had actually had a decent story and done with some style (such as in the actual show) they would have been better. Take a look at the Wrath of Khan. You felt every phaser hit, it meant something.

Khan resurrected the cold heart of trekkies - The Motion Picture was a "new" story in the Star Trek line, but Khan brought the nostalgia back on a storyline all the trekkies knew. Search for Spock was the typical sequel attempting to keep the ball rolling uphill which never works out. The rest were true to the Star Trek M.O. of hooking social and political stories into the realm, but saving the whales and bridging political/warring camps was just too much politics and too little Star Trek. TNG ... meh, not the original and thus the movies didn't really hold sway, but there really was no way to keep it rolling with McCoy and Scotty becoming corpses and Shatner's ego was too big even for Nimoy, not to mention his pant's size.

[statisticalfool]

Yeah, I wasn't clear enough. So, I agree, there's nothing stopping great space combat.

But compare inertialess, any direction all the time movement (like WoW) to say:

Virtua On, which technically has little to no inertia, but combat relies heavily on using movement abilities which can only be used in certain combinations and only cancel in certain ways. Winning this game (other than the twitch factor) is about forcing your opponent to use their moves and dodges so you can hammer them when they stop.

Compare this to PotBS ship combat (Eve would be a better example probably, but haven't played), which is about high-inertia, hard-to-turn boats, and the game becomes about out manuevering in order to make your lines of fire better than theirs.

Everything we've seen about STO suggests the ship combat is heavily in the PotBS mode. This doesn't mean it's necessarily better or worse, but the game systems which can work change.

There is no inertia in ST tech unless a captain wants it. This is unlike SW tech. Eve is more of a hybrid.

I think you guys are confusing potential with experience. Outside of advanced Eve battles, there's no good space battle MMOs. But that doesn't mean space combat has some intrinsic disadvantage. It just means it has been done to its full potential. Like so many other things missing from this genre.

[Tmon]

I got a beta invite a while back, due to some misplaced exuberance about CO (bought a six month sub) since I have no interest in Star Trek and am perfectly happy playing DAO instead of an MMO I deleted it.  I still get emails telling me when the beta test servers are up so I guess the fact that I've never downloaded the client or logged in doesn't matter.

[UnSub]

Less than 2 weeks until open beta starts, so people will find out soon enough when the NDA drops.

[Nebu]

Less than 2 weeks until open beta starts, so people will find out soon enough when the NDA drops.

I'm going to bet that any of you veteran MMO gamers/writers could do a complete write-up of this before the beta even starts with little to no prior knowledge.  Yes... I think it's going to be a repeat of everything else we've all seen in the past 5 years with a new skin.  

If you've ever seen the movie critic that reviews movies without ever seeing them, I bet the same could be applied to the MMO genre.  STO isn't going to bring anything new to the table.  Period. 

[Venkman]

And you would win that bet if anyone was willing to take it

[Evildrider]

Less than 2 weeks until open beta starts, so people will find out soon enough when the NDA drops.

I'm going to bet that any of you veteran MMO gamers/writers could do a complete write-up of this before the beta even starts with little to no prior knowledge.  Yes... I think it's going to be a repeat of everything else we've all seen in the past 5 years with a new skin.  

If you've ever seen the movie critic that reviews movies without ever seeing them, I bet the same could be applied to the MMO genre.  STO isn't going to bring anything new to the table.  Period. 

Neither did WoW.

Now I'm not saying this is going to be a WoW type success, just that a game can be successful if it can just be fucking fun!

[Nebu]

Neither did WoW.

Now I'm not saying this is going to be a WoW type success, just that a game can be successful if it can just be fucking fun!

WoW did bring something new to the table:  Polish.  WoW was a diku-based MMO that managed to capture the fun by limiting the useless cockblocks all while streamlining the amusement park ride.  Superficially, WoW appears to have brought nothing new... but when you look deeper, it is a vastly different MMO experience than its predicessors.  That and the Blizzard name made WoW the runaway success that it is. 

[Slyfeind]

If we're talking polish, then superficially WoW is a different experience, but when you look deeper it brought nothing new to the table.

[Malakili]

Neither did WoW.

Now I'm not saying this is going to be a WoW type success, just that a game can be successful if it can just be fucking fun!

This is the problem though.  "Fun" is almost impossible to pin down.   In fact, I'd say fun has almost nothing to do with WoW's success.

Its

1) Easy.  Which is good, because most thing that are difficult get described as frustrating or unfun, or whatever.  So, anyone can play with barely any training.
2) Has basically no cockblocks at this point.  The days of long involved attunements seem to be over, any player can accomplish nearly everything the game has to offer.
3) On the same note:  Goals are easy to set, and quick to accomplish.   For the average player, goals are frequently set and attained.  Blizzard has perfected the "ding grats"


To summarize: I guess I would say that WoW is much more "addicting" than fun.  It gives you tons of reasons to want to log in,  and very few reasons (frustrations) that make you want to log out.     More to the point, I think this is the formula for success more than fun, and what most developers haven't realized yet.   Maybe I'm cynical, but I really think that the reason WoW has been so successful is that it has perfected the addicting aspects of MMOs, while jettisoning anything that makes people want to quit.

[Venkman]

WoW at launch was polished, fun, complete and playable on day one. It's aged well, but you need to concentrate on what it was in 2004 to understand why just being fun and polished was enough (to add to a huge ass budget, big publishered, staggered global launch feedback look, gamer-centric IP, gamer-centric renowned development company name, etc).

"Fun" is subjective, yes. But when your game is just like a prior successful model, you don't have to worry about reinventing the wheel to discover what is fun. You can be successful and not bring much new to the table. And WoW is EQ1 done right. But "done right" still has no equal five years on. Because it's not really all that easy to do right. And usually that's because it's a smaller team with a necessarily narrower worldview or a myopic team lead that doesn't allow for dissension.

[Malakili]

WoW at launch was polished, fun, complete and playable on day one. It's aged well, but you need to concentrate on what it was in 2004 to understand why just being fun and polished was enough

But that isn't enough anymore, I don't think. Aion seemed as polished as anything we've seen in a while in terms of an MMO launch, and that has only done moderately well.  And that was launched a year later here than in Asia, so they had a lot of  "post launch" time there, in reality.   

If you released World of Warcraft as it was at launch, in today's market, it would go the same way as nearly everything since it.  Sure, I understand why that worked when it did, but I don't think you can look at it to see what will work NOW.   Unless that isn't your point.

[Lantyssa]

Aion didn't flop though, it is simply too grindy for a lot of tastes that have grown used to WoW.  That is the only reason I am not playing it.  Had it come around during my MUD years, it wouldn't phase me.

Polish accounts for more than you're giving it credit.  Not just polish on making things work, but internal dev processes, too.

[Ratman_tf]

WoW at launch was polished, fun, complete and playable on day one.

WoW launched plagued with bugs, some of which didn't get fixed for years (lootlock anyone?) with very sparse endgame content (Molten Bore and Onyxia) and balance problems. (Lolret) Still, it was fun. And that was enough.

[Ratman_tf]

Maybe I'm cynical, but I really think that the reason WoW has been so successful is that it has perfected the addicting aspects of MMOs, while jettisoning anything that makes people want to quit.

Companies and people yark about this or that game being the 'WoW Killer', but I think the only game that's going to dethrone WoW is the one that takes a look at what people bitch about in WoW and not include that in their game.

The easier a game is, the more people who can play, the more potential subs a game can nab. See: Facebook games. I don't even think this is a bad thing if a game includes achievements, like WoW added, so the peen wavers can have something to make them feel special.