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Author Topic: Features that only game X has that more MMOs should have.  (Read 20715 times)
Telemediocrity
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Reply #35 on: August 14, 2006, 01:37:02 AM

That's true enough, and they certainly haven't been unique. However, its also evident that Tele would continually split hairs to try and claim that all his suggestions were only available in AC no matter what examples were given, and would claim that the minute difference between the AC implementation and that of other games was crucial to his enjoyment. So, given that he created the thread, its unlikely that the title will change short of an admin or mod griefing him.

Uh, what?  Someone mentioned that writeable books were done in other games - I have no evidence that other games didn't do that, and so I went with it.  Someone mentioned that in their opinion lore sucks, to which I replied, "I like lore."  Someone claimed that CoH's sidekick system is in any way related to the patron/vassal relationships present in AC (and I guess AC2), and I replied "No, they're actually completely different, and here's how they're different."

How in the world am I "splitting hairs to try and claim that all my suggestions were only available in AC"?
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Reply #36 on: August 14, 2006, 01:53:43 AM

For ref, UO had writeable books. Limited to 20 pages of really large-print text, if I recall right. I played UO briefly after launch and my 'role' in the anti-PK guild I was in, since I had a shitty connection and computer, was to sit around writing books about the guild's adventures and victories against the PKs. It was... unconventional.

I know writable books have existed in various MUDs since at least '95, but I dunno if MUDs count in this thread's worldview. They've also obviously existed as long as MUSHes have.
lamaros
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Reply #37 on: August 14, 2006, 03:49:26 AM

I like some of the Artistic design in Guildwars. I think it is aweosome. Some of the indoor or underground areas, with the lighting comming through and the statues, carvings, etc on the walls - I don't think I've played another MMORPG-like game that has conveyed atmosphere as well on sheer area design and art alone. One of my favourite things about it, if not exactly a 'feature' in this threads sense of the word.

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Reply #38 on: August 16, 2006, 05:17:49 AM

I don't know if this was just a rumour or if it actually happened but - I recall hearing that books written by players in UO could start appearing in bookshelves elsewhere in the gameworld automagically. Sounds like a nice way of "publishing" player-written books in any case, whether it happened or not.

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Telemediocrity
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Reply #39 on: August 16, 2006, 09:54:38 AM

If that actually happened, that's incredible.
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Reply #40 on: August 16, 2006, 02:09:19 PM

In game writing was indeed in the UO books. I used to leave missives to my victims after robbing their houses blind.

Your precious AC isn't the only one doing randomized lego dungeons. Anarchy Online's mission generators work on the same principal. Diablo does as well... thought it's in a grey area of being an MMO. Most "dungeons" you see in any game probably start out that way. A set of interlocking assets that can be arranged seamlessly to a designer's whim. AO and AC just moved the arrangement to a randomization server thing, instead of making an artist/designer piece them together manually.

The point being that a lot of what you considered unique to one game really isn't. Just about any feature can be found somewhere else, if you look close enough. It's the set of which features they decided to implement that make a game unique, IMO. Some features you might like in one game, would be odd in another. Player housing, for example would feel strange in Warcraft to me because they could not be placed in the world to match it's seamlessness. So you'd be running into an instance portal in Old Town or something silly. Just because you really like, doesn't necessarily mean it will enhance a different game.
Telemediocrity
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Reply #41 on: August 16, 2006, 04:05:08 PM

In game writing was indeed in the UO books. I used to leave missives to my victims after robbing their houses blind.

Good to know.

Quote
Your precious AC isn't the only one doing randomized lego dungeons. Anarchy Online's mission generators work on the same principal. Diablo does as well... thought it's in a grey area of being an MMO. Most "dungeons" you see in any game probably start out that way. A set of interlocking assets that can be arranged seamlessly to a designer's whim. AO and AC just moved the arrangement to a randomization server thing, instead of making an artist/designer piece them together manually.

I take it you haven't actually played AC?  AC has no random dungeons.  None whatsoever.  I'm sorry if I sound strident, but if you'll read what I wrote:

Quote from: Televangelist
2.  Use of prefabricated parts in dungeon construction.  By snapping together pieces like lego bricks, AC now has somewhere on the order of 1,000 dungeons - and you can still make really interesting designs.

Nowhere did I say anything about randomness.

AC's dungeons are all handcrafted, and 95+% of them appear handcrafted - as opposed to AO, where for better or for worse you could really tell it was random.

As for whether other games start with precrafted parts for their dungeons, they might - but the proof is in the pudding.  I want a MMO with hundreds of handcrafted dungeons, and I haven't found other games that offer that.  The lego aspect is just a means to  an end.

Quote
The point being that a lot of what you considered unique to one game really isn't. Just about any feature can be found somewhere else, if you look close enough. It's the set of which features they decided to implement that make a game unique, IMO. Some features you might like in one game, would be odd in another.

On the writeable book point, I haven't disputed you.  Your talk on dungeons rested on a complete misreading of what I wrote.

Quote
Player housing, for example would feel strange in Warcraft to me because they could not be placed in the world to match it's seamlessness. So you'd be running into an instance portal in Old Town or something silly. Just because you really like, doesn't necessarily mean it will enhance a different game.

What if they retconned the world to increase its size, spread things out a bit, increase everyone's runspeeds to match, and then plopped housing on the landscape rather than in separate zones?

That's always what I thought they should have done with DAoC.

Frankly, though, I think both WoW and DAoC have really erred with the tiny size of their ingame landmasses.
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Reply #42 on: August 16, 2006, 09:52:42 PM

Frankly, though, I think both WoW and DAoC have really erred with the tiny size of their ingame landmasses.

In DAoC, at least, it felt huge because character ran at a rather slow pace. Until you got maxed out speed buffs and whatnot, it was really good.

As for WoW, I think they did this purposely because they wanted faster travel...  whcih I don't like, but that's a different issue.

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Telemediocrity
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Reply #43 on: August 17, 2006, 02:00:43 AM

I was a Troll Warrior in Midgard without a clan at the game's release - speed buffs were not forthcoming.  And yet, the world still felt relatively small to me.  That might just be a matter of personal taste.
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Reply #44 on: August 17, 2006, 02:21:25 AM

I suppose my view may be skewed by nostolgia for the game, but the game seemed really big to me until I ran into my first invisible wall I found in the game that was outside one of the main cities. That kinda sucked. But also, they didn't have in-game maps which I believe made the landscape seem much, much larger. Specially in a heavily forested area like a lot of Hibernia was, which was the realm I played.

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Telemediocrity
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Reply #45 on: August 17, 2006, 09:01:57 AM

Hmm.  Oh, I thought of one thing I love about AC that I haven't seen in other games:

NPCs who are broadly aware of the fact that nobody will ever die in the game world, and react accordingly.  It's fully part of the storyline that nobody dies in AC; that part isn't unique, whether the game explains it with reconstruction terminals, lifestones, medical bays, etcetera.

What's different about AC is that the whole entire plot is written around this fact.  When the Evil Mastermind attacks, he knows he's not going to kill you.  He knows you'll be back in 10 minutes whacking at him again.

Different NPCs react differently to this.  Some find it amusing, others tedious, some fall into existential despair and it changes their worldview.  But the game never ever pretended like the NPCs killed you because they really thought you'd Stay Dead.  I like that, and consequently, when a newer MMORPG wants me to pretend that all the NPCs fear death even when there's a bindstone 10 feet away, it breaks the Fourth Wall to me.
WindiaN
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Reply #46 on: August 17, 2006, 09:25:39 AM

So uhh, it may be outrageous to say any MMO should adopt anything from Lineage 2 but I wish more games could handle massive castle sieges which have large impacts on server economy (being able to collect taxes on towns for example). That game could have 500 something players and hundreds of NPCs on the same screen with very little lag (so long as you turned off player names... in a battle that large it hardly mattered because every player has an attack/defense icon).
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Reply #47 on: August 17, 2006, 09:55:01 AM

1. A Tale in the Desert — waypoints, storiing up offline time to expend as travel time in getting from point A to point B, would like to see offline time used for other "batched" activity & skills…

2. WoW — very cool representation of orcs & trolls

3. Shadowbane - minus the sb.exe phenomenon, best full scale PvP+, way better than all the RvR crapola of other games which I abhor…

4. EQ — as stated in previous posts, the bard was a unique class and playstyle, and "bards" in other MMO games have not come close to capturing…

5. NWN — world building/campaign creation tools for the user…

I realize there are all sorts of nifty new MMO offerings, but since I'm primarily a Mac Luser these days, don't know all that's new and shiny in the newest and greatest Windoze offerings…

"Should the batman kill Joker because it would save more lives?" is a fundamentally different question from "should the batman have a bunch of machineguns that go BATBATBATBATBAT because its totally cool?". ~Goumindong
Rithrin
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Reply #48 on: August 17, 2006, 12:12:06 PM

NPCs who are broadly aware of the fact that nobody will ever die in the game world, and react accordingly.

Different NPCs react differently to this.  Some find it amusing, others tedious, some fall into existential despair and it changes their worldview.  But the game never ever pretended like the NPCs killed you because they really thought you'd Stay Dead.  I like that, and consequently, when a newer MMORPG wants me to pretend that all the NPCs fear death even when there's a bindstone 10 feet away, it breaks the Fourth Wall to me.

Ooh, that's so true. It always bugged me in an MMO when you'd hear an NPC talk about some great warlord finally managed to be taken down and that's why they built a monument of him or somesuch think. I just think "Well, why didn't he just return to his bind point like everyone else?" However, I do believe Shadowbane had the whole respawning thing built into its story, its just that there were no NPCs to really care about it.


Another feature I wish would be in more games:

A in-depth faction system akin to EQ's. Sure, WoW and DAoC have factions, to an extent, but nowhere on the scale of EverQuest. Basically every NPC was hooked up to multiple factions and the player is free to raise or lower whichever factions he wanted. In EQ, if I wanted to, I could completely ally myself with my opposing faction by doing enough quests/killing enough mobs that raised faction with them to earn their trust. And it had a huge difference on how the game played for me. In WoW, faction is only used for yet another grind to get gear.

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Reply #49 on: August 17, 2006, 12:18:22 PM


A in-depth faction system akin to EQ's. Sure, WoW and DAoC have factions, to an extent, but nowhere on the scale of EverQuest. Basically every NPC was hooked up to multiple factions and the player is free to raise or lower whichever factions he wanted. In EQ, if I wanted to, I could completely ally myself with my opposing faction by doing enough quests/killing enough mobs that raised faction with them to earn their trust. And it had a huge difference on how the game played for me. In WoW, faction is only used for yet another grind to get gear.

True.

So much so that when EQ did the race server PvP+ deal, I was disappointed and wished more so for a "religion" based faction setup. One where you choose religious alignment at character creation (or choose not to decide), yet can earn (or be excommunicated so to speak) yourself into another faction…

"Should the batman kill Joker because it would save more lives?" is a fundamentally different question from "should the batman have a bunch of machineguns that go BATBATBATBATBAT because its totally cool?". ~Goumindong
edlavallee
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Reply #50 on: August 17, 2006, 12:47:25 PM

My faves:

Thanes from DAoC -- I never understood why people thought they sucked... I loved mine but not enough to continue playing the zergfest that is DAoC.

Mailboxs from WoW -- finally a way for me to move items

Auction house from WoW -- nice although the economic forces dizzy the mind

Useful crafting from DAoC -- at least before I stopped playing, crafted items were as good if not better than almost every world drop. This allowed a casual like me to be able to be equipped on par with some of the catasses

Exemplar/Sidekick from CoH -- mentioned before, but what a great concept

Sense of wonder from EQ -- ahh, memories. No game will ever capture that sense of wonder for me, but you never forget your first...

Diversity of world content from EQ -- the sheer size of the map and the diversity of the geography was nice

Day/night and weather from EQ -- Sunrises in Butcherblock and rain in the Karanas; eye pleasing. And, I didn't mind being a human blind at night.

Mistmoore -- god, I lived in that place.

Off line training from EVE -- already mentioned before

I'm sure there is more that I am not remembering at the moment...

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Reply #51 on: August 17, 2006, 04:03:18 PM

Mailboxs from WoW -- finally a way for me to move items

Auction house from WoW -- nice although the economic forces dizzy the mind
Both done earlier in FF XI and done far better in the case of AHs.
WindupAtheist
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Reply #52 on: August 19, 2006, 01:45:18 PM

UO had writeable books?

Yes.

Also, I want more games to have a housing system similar to current UO, where I can design it from the foundation up to look however I want.  That's good shit.

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Telemediocrity
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Reply #53 on: August 19, 2006, 02:46:42 PM

I'm cool with housing in a game with dev-made content as long as the players have no say in deciding where it goes (In a hypothetical, Dawn/Wurm-like game, it might make sense that way).  I think player-made housing tends to make games worse rather than better; I've seen almost no games that have done it reasonably well.  It just seems to kill the nice flow of the world with a random mishmash of crap.
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Reply #54 on: August 19, 2006, 03:49:08 PM

MMORPG makes have never heard of zoning laws. It really is simple: limit one house per person, allocate enough room for those houses and allocate that space only in certain spots.

If people unsub for 3 months or so their house goes away unless there is a free plot available.

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Telemediocrity
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Reply #55 on: August 19, 2006, 04:10:48 PM

What I'd like to see is housing that's less common, but shapes how you play your character.  For instance, very rarely have houses deep in "bad evil things" territory, but your living there means that you can sort of bend the surrounding baddies to your will, or that over time you become like them and have a thirst for innocent blood, that sort of thing.

In other words, incentivize the gameplay so that if you live "on the wrong side of the tracks", you actually play like it.  To where players say "I don't trust him, he's from _____ shady area".

Another pet peeve of mine.  Too often, games only give players reasons to trust and cooperate with one another - all the incentives are for cooperation, and competition is limited to clearly-defined sides (He's either One of Us or One of Them).  I like game systems that make things more ambiguous, where you meet someone and you're really not sure whether you should trust them or not.

Developers really seem to slap together PvP systems as an afterthought rather than planning out gameplay like that.
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Reply #56 on: August 20, 2006, 01:35:52 AM

I love your idea there...

In other words, incentivize the gameplay so that if you live "on the wrong side of the tracks", you actually play like it.  To where players say "I don't trust him, he's from _____ shady area".

It would make sense if you had a house or a lair or something out near where "Bloodthirsty Bob" the local cutthroat lived, then people would start making connections between you two. "Hmm, he never seems to have problems with that Bob guy, maybe they're working together..."

Developers really seem to slap together PvP systems as an afterthought rather than planning out gameplay like that.

Well for a lot of people PvP is just a fancy word for ganking, so a lot of devs probably feel like they don't need to go much higher than those expectations.

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Reply #57 on: August 21, 2006, 02:24:52 PM

I don't see how the FFXI AHs were any better.

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Reply #58 on: August 21, 2006, 04:10:47 PM

I don't see how the FFXI AHs were any better.
They have a price history for every item.
Strazos
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Reply #59 on: August 22, 2006, 11:59:56 AM

Oh yeah, they did...

Still, I remember distinctly disliking their AH system.

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Margalis
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Reply #60 on: August 22, 2006, 06:22:34 PM

I played both, FFXI was better for AHs. The WOW AHs were annoying to use, they just weren't presented or organized all that well.

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Telemediocrity
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Reply #61 on: August 22, 2006, 10:39:45 PM

Okay, I thought of a few more things that AC has that other games should copy:

The rare system.  AC added 'rares' with the second expansion, Throne of Destiny.  These are cool and interesting items - everything from a gem that makes you 99% immune to fire damage for 15 minutes, to an endless pot of colored dye, to a pack that holds double the normal amount, to a skeleton key that can open any locked door in the game, to powerful armor and weaponry, to an infinitely refilling quiver of deadly arrows.

The rares are divided into tiers.  The top tier (uber armor and weaponry) is several thousand times rarer than the bottom tier.  Every single creature in the game has the exact same chance of dropping a rare upon death (a very tiny chance).  Your character is also guaranteed to find at least one rare per month.

Every rare is tradeable and has no usage requirements - the idea is that if you get a rare, you can either start using it right away no matter what level you are, or trade it for whatever your heart desires.

How are they balanced, you ask?  Every rare is flagged to Always Drop On Death.

All the rares look cool and have a major Shiny Factor to them.

It's not a majorly game-changing dynamic, but it's cool to have it there.
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Reply #62 on: August 26, 2006, 03:45:08 PM

Interesting thread. I'll toss a few in:

 - agreement with Tele (shiver) on AC's twichy ranged combat. IF I sidestep an arrow, it should miss me.
 - SWG's general approach to mix and match skill based classes (pre-NGE). It was hurt by the excesiive grind involved, but I really liked the fact I could make a character that had a unique blend of skills and styles. I could make a character whose focus was entirely non-combat, yet still take enough combat to shoot a womp rat or two
 - on the same note, SWGs ability to advance a charcacter without resorting to combat
 - Seamless worlds - not unique to one game, but a big thing to me for immersion.
 - AC's lack of artificial barriers. If I could jump over something, or find a way up something, I could get there.
 - Truely diverse character design. CoH is probably the leader in this rightnow. I should look unique, not just what armor I wear.
 - UO Seige Perilous - no selling crap to vendors. I loved how that effected the economy.
 - SWG - the idea of diverse craftin materials, gained from various sources, and being able to create somewhat unique results when crafting. It never worked as well as it was intended, but the idea was great
 - Housing - I think it's a great thing, if it's built in to the design ofthe game. No one has it perfect yet, but I liked AC and UO's in game houses, UO's and SWG's plaable houses, AC's huge guild houses. All good things, you just need a way to implement them without UO and SWG's sprawl issues.
 - WoW's hand crafted world. Random generated terrain sucks my ass.

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damijin
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Reply #63 on: August 28, 2006, 09:28:02 AM

Here's one nobody has mentioned and I'm certain would be the center of controversy:

Forced first person perspective. Done in Planetside, though with limited third person view, WWIIOL, probably Neocron (never played it), and most famously, Everquest (out of technical limitation moreso than design).

Perhaps this is best suited to a more twitch based game, but I really enjoy playing a virtual world from the first person. It adds heaps of immersion. Perhaps I'm being self-centered with my next statement, but, the only reason that I do not play games which allow first AND third person, is because they typically are designed with third person in mind.

For instance, playing from third person in nearly any game with PvP is ideal over first person for the simple reason of range of view. In most games, playing from third person is significantly better in PvE as well, because it allows you to assess the larger situation more easily. I would like to see a game that imposes first person perspective as a limitation on players ability to omnipotently fly behind their characters and assess everything around them. I feel that it helps immersion in ways that no amount of books or lore can even touch, and it's generally fun to play from the eyes of your own character.
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Reply #64 on: August 28, 2006, 11:21:36 AM

Why limit it to mmo? I've wished forever there was a game that incorporated melee combat from Oni, sneaking from Thief, ranged like BF1942 (with discreet hotboxes, bullet spread, crouching/prone, etc), alignment system ala KotOR, etc.

In my opinion an mmo should put together the best elements from other genres.
Quote
Well for a lot of people PvP is just a fancy word for ganking, so a lot of devs probably feel like they don't need to go much higher than those expectations.
That's because of how the game is structured. If you slap pvp on a game designed for pve, of course it's ganking. There is no ganking in BF2 or Planetside. That's why I've long been a fan of instancing adventure content and having a pvp+ overworld experience.
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Reply #65 on: August 28, 2006, 05:00:30 PM

Forced first person perspective. Done in Planetside, though with limited third person view, WWIIOL, probably Neocron (never played it), and most famously, Everquest (out of technical limitation moreso than design).
EQ did not force first person perspective, and in fact most people I know played in 3rd person mode since it obviously gave you a better situational awareness of your immediate surroundings.
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Reply #66 on: August 28, 2006, 07:07:36 PM

In practice, forcing 1st person perspective limits gameplay options and prejudices one playstyle over another in MMO-based PvP - makes life harder for melees, since they're easier to spot when attacking because they have to close within range to hit.  Which then requires the game designers to bias in favor of heavy melee damage, since they're easier to spot as they try and close.  Which then requires that you stick within the rock-paper-scissors PvP format that has made PvP suck in pretty much every MMO to date.
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Reply #67 on: August 28, 2006, 07:33:12 PM

Forced first person perspective. Done in Planetside, though with limited third person view, WWIIOL, probably Neocron (never played it), and most famously, Everquest (out of technical limitation moreso than design).
EQ did not force first person perspective, and in fact most people I know played in 3rd person mode since it obviously gave you a better situational awareness of your immediate surroundings.


When I played EQ the third person was like... a camera set in a really wierd fixed position. I think they added a more practical third person cam later, but when I came back for Discord server I still used first person out of habbit.

Quote
In practice, forcing 1st person perspective limits gameplay options and prejudices one playstyle over another in MMO-based PvP - makes life harder for melees, since they're easier to spot when attacking because they have to close within range to hit.  Which then requires the game designers to bias in favor of heavy melee damage, since they're easier to spot as they try and close.  Which then requires that you stick within the rock-paper-scissors PvP format that has made PvP suck in pretty much every MMO to date.

I have no idea how you just managed to blame RPS design on first person but, bravo. I don't see how the perspective really limits melees against ranged classes or how a decent designer would not be able to overcome the limitations imposed by first person perspective. If anything, it gives melees an advantage. Ranged classes will not be able to look around themselves in 360 degrees wich would provide more opportunity for a melee to sneak up behind you and strike while you're distracted with something else.


However, I have debated with myself if this desire for first person is part of that whole "wanting games to be like your first game" syndrome; I think it's Bartle who always argued that point. It could be me simply trying to chase the immersion that I found in my first online RPG (EQ), but on the other hand I tend to have had more fun in MMOFPS games with first person perspective than I have in any third person RPG. So I'm not entirely sure what my real motivation for wanting first person is, all I know is that I like it.
« Last Edit: August 28, 2006, 07:39:49 PM by damijin »
Telemediocrity
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Reply #68 on: August 28, 2006, 10:33:24 PM

Quote from: Damijin
I have no idea how you just managed to blame RPS design on first person but, bravo. I don't see how the perspective really limits melees against ranged classes or how a decent designer would not be able to overcome the limitations imposed by first person perspective. If anything, it gives melees an advantage. Ranged classes will not be able to look around themselves in 360 degrees wich would provide more opportunity for a melee to sneak up behind you and strike while you're distracted with something else.

I'm not blaming, merely correlating.  Why does third person perspective hurt melee classes?  Because they need the third person camera most in order to be able to dodge ranged attacks effectively, see what's coming at them from all sides.  Most MMOs have sticky melee of some kind for PvP, so if a melee's going to hit you, he's going to hit you - but having a 3rd person camera (presumably one you can rotate and spin at will) is essential to a melee's ability to physically dodge ranged attacks (i.e. step out of the way, not just a skillcheck).

With 1st person, out of necessity you're limited to systems where the dodging of projectiles is determined primarily by skill-check rather than by the player's twitch skills.  Which, before long, leads you to RPS design.  (The term I use for the alternative is "Gauntlet" design - where you have archers, mages, warriors, etc. but they have more similarities than differences in terms of their role, and they don't interlock with the Holy Trinity).
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Reply #69 on: August 28, 2006, 11:20:06 PM

With 1st person, out of necessity you're limited to systems where the dodging of projectiles is determined primarily by skill-check rather than by the player's twitch skills.
Right, because in games like Quake and Unreal Tournament it's impossible to dodge projectiles by, like, moving out of the way,
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