Will someone PLEASE make a Shadowrun MMO?!

[Akkori]

Jeez, FASA has some good products out there. Battletech too, btw. Quite the rich story line. And what's cooler than the Matrix or BattleMechs!?

[Morat20]

Jeez, FASA has some good products out there. Battletech too, btw. Quite the rich story line. And what's cooler than the Matrix or BattleMechs!?

Battletech would be nice. They removed the Battlepods from my local Dave and Buster's. I was an unhappy camper.

[Xilren's Twin]

Battletech would be nice. They removed the Battlepods from my local Dave and Buster's.

Dave and Buster's ... AKA...  Chuckie Cheeses for Adults.

That being said, you just know someone would screw that IP up b/c it has too many elements.  Cyberpunk hacking plus magic plus biomod weaponry and big guns and vehicles. Too many different game systems would end up with each of them being meh, leading to a world of suck from a cool license.

Xilren

[stray]

Would be glad to NOT see elves and orcs for awhile no matter timeline or setting they're in.

[Morat20]

Dave and Buster's ... AKA...  Chuckie Cheeses for Adults.

Chuckie's wouldn't be so bad (my kid loves it) if they had booze too. :) Dave and Busters? Mucho booze.

That being said, you just know someone would screw that IP up b/c it has too many elements.  Cyberpunk hacking plus magic plus biomod weaponry and big guns and vehicles. Too many different game systems would end up with each of them being meh, leading to a world of suck from a cool license.

Xilren

You'd hope they'd do it in stages. First is just combat, second is hacking, third goes into rigging.....

Or they'd simplify it: Fighter, Hacker, Mage and sub-class from there.

[Murgos]

You launch format -f at a lvl 3 ICE.
You hit the lvl 3 ICE for 6 points of damage!
The lvl 3 ICE attacks you with a voltage oscillation.
The lvl 3 ICE hits you for 829 points of damage!
You have died!
Please wait, loading...

[geldonyetich]

I'll get right on it.  I'll need a million dollars and lawyers to stave off Microsoft's claim on the copyright.

After all, there's not much chance these guys are going to pull off their strategy of making a game and hoping Microsoft will buy it from them.

[Lantyssa]

Unfortunately Microsoft does not want to treat these properties as MMOs.

Shadowrun is going to be a silly Vista launch FPS.  Battletech 3025 was killed a few months prior to release, speculatively because of MS shenanigans.

[Nonentity]

http://www.shadowrun-online.com/sro/ ?

Little indie project - but apparently they've already been contacted by Microsoft. About what and who is anyone's guess.

[WayAbvPar]

I am in for a box and a month if they get it off and running.

[Nonentity]

Well, the project is being touted as a Proof of Concept to propose to MGS. They're using Torque right now.

I dunno, some of the stuff looks pretty good. From the one person I know in the project (lower down, real life pal of mine) they have some pretty good guys on the team.

[d4rkj3di]

Battletech 3025 was killed a few months prior to release, speculatively because of MS shenanigans.

I'd say closer to a couple of weeks prior to release, that game was all but done. And the MS shenanigans was buying FASA, and then having EA realize that meant they lost their rights to Battletech, and folding shop. Shadowrun will never be made into an MMO because one of the things that will determine that is the performance of the Vistariffic FPS. It will tank, and Microsoft will write off the franchise.

[geldonyetich]

I liked Battlefield 3025 (the recent canceled match-based online game - this one) when I played it in beta, but rose quite a stink that the game had no cones of fire.  As a result, a medium laser was as accurate as a PPC, and that totally defeated the balance that FASA put into them. 

For old time's sake, I'll illustrate the point:

Medium lasers were like 1-3 (+0 BTH), 4-6 (+2 BTH), 7-9 (+4 BTH).
PPCs were like 0-3 (too close, +6 BTH penalty), 3-6 (+0 BTH), 7-12 (+2 BTH), 13-18 (+4 BTH).
BTH being a Base to Hit modification on a 2d6 roll.  So basically, all weapons had a certain range in which their accuracy fell off, and this would have been perfectly modeled by a cone of fire.

Because BT3025 lacked that cone, after a few days of practice you could surgically remove whatever you wanted at the maximum range of whatever weapon you've got with equal ease of longer range weapons.

No, I didn't write this to troll Megrim.

[geldonyetich]

One important thing I forgot to mention, the reason why it mattered that a PPC couldn't be as accurate as a medium laser was because Battlefield 3025  (the canceled semi-MMOG) took the original mech designs from the source material.  These designs were built using specific building rules that had each weapon take up a varying amount of weight and critical slots out of the maximum a mech could have.  Putting a Particle Projection Cannon (PPC) on a mech would prevent you from mounting up to six medium lasers, and yet it only did as much damage as two of them.  The accuracy advantage (not to mention random location damage assignment) is what made that work, and as long as they had no cone of fire there was no accuracy advantage.  Thus, the decision to have no cone of fire yet preserve the original designs broke the back of the balance.  The actual range of the weapon was nothing compared to the accuracy consideration.

[Trippy]

Microsoft, who owns the computer gaming rights to the FASA products via their acquisition of FASA Interactive, seems to be allergic to MMOs at the moment. They did publish AC 1 and 2 but 2 obviously didn't do so well and then they cancelled Mythica to focus their attention on Vanguard and then they gave *that* back to Sigil. They, along with EA, seem to be content to sit on the MMOG sidelines right now, even though they have the most resources to plow into such endeavours. EA does seem to be stirring a bit with their acquisition of Mythic but they also haven't announced any new projects yet so nothing really has changed except for some Mythic-related people getting a ton of money.

[dusematic]

Shadowrun MMO is like the newest nerd trend. 

[Trippy]

Shadowrun MMO is like the newest nerd trend. 

Nah, that became passe when people found out the Shadowrun game MS was working on was a shooter. The newest nerd MMO trend is the Deadlands one.

[UnSub]

Shadowrun MMO is like the newest nerd trend. 

Nah, that became passe when people found out the Shadowrun game MS was working on was a shooter. The newest nerd MMO trend is the Deadlands one.

All the cool nerds are waiting for Deadlands.

Microsoft holds FASA's properties. Which means the only option is to copy every element of Shadowrun into a MMOG, but change the important names. Boy, I can't wait for Darksprint Online so I can play a cyborg trollzor!

[geldonyetich]

Maybe they can make a Renegade Legion: Interceptor MMORPG.  After all, they did make Alleigence.

[Lantyssa]

BT3025 certainly wasn't perfect, but it was the closest to the source material we will ever see.  We had fun at all weight classes and that is what mattered to me.

I'm there for Darksprint Online.

[Trippy]

BT3025 certainly wasn't perfect, but it was the closest to the source material we will ever see.  We had fun at all weight classes and that is what mattered to me.

I didn't play BT3025 but MechWarrior 2 was the awesomest.

[dusematic]

Shadowrun MMO is like the newest nerd trend. 

Nah, that became passe when people found out the Shadowrun game MS was working on was a shooter. The newest nerd MMO trend is the Deadlands one.

Good point.  Close though.

[Kail]

Microsoft holds FASA's properties. Which means the only option is to copy every element of Shadowrun into a MMOG, but change the important names. Boy, I can't wait for Darksprint Online so I can play a cyborg trollzor!

I refuse to believe that Microsoft holds trademarks on Elves, Orks, and machine guns.  If you write a good Shadowrun MMO and Microsoft kicks your ass, it'll take you all of about five minutes to change all the copyrighted names.

But yeah, I agree with Xilren.  There are just too many ways to screw it up.  I suppose you could release it in stages, theoretically, but has that ever worked before?

[Damn Dirty Ape]

Since Shadowrun is little more than cybernetic elves wearing trenchcoats and packing BFGs, there's no need for a Shadowrun MMO.  City of Heroes has you covered!

[stray]

Microsoft holds FASA's properties. Which means the only option is to copy every element of Shadowrun into a MMOG, but change the important names. Boy, I can't wait for Darksprint Online so I can play a cyborg trollzor!

I refuse to believe that Microsoft holds trademarks on Elves, Orks, and machine guns.

So what you're saying is, "Damn whatever else about Shadowrun, the real reason it's cool is actually because of elves and orcs...We just need to rip off that"?  :-(

[Soln]

Shadowrun minus the fairy magic would still rock my world.  A cyberpunk world where investigation, stealth, information peddling really matter -- plus blowing shit up.  My choice right now would be CCP for it.  But they're distracted with White Wolf stuff for the phuture.

[Kail]

I refuse to believe that Microsoft holds trademarks on Elves, Orks, and machine guns.

So what you're saying is, "Damn whatever else about Shadowrun, the real reason it's cool is actually because of elves and orcs...We just need to rip off that"?  :-(

Ah, oops, heh.  What I actually meant was that most of the uniqueness of Shadowrun comes from combining very generic elements in unique ways (Elven computer hackers,  Cyborgs vs. Wizards, etc.).  If someone were to make a Shadowrun ripoff, even if it was very blatant and very direct, and Microsoft made them remove everything that was copyrighted, what you'd end up with could still be pretty close to Shadowrun.  You can probably still do a game about dwarfs and cyborgs being mercenaries in the future without running into copyright issues with Microsoft, because if Microsoft owned the copyright on this stuff, every other game company in the world would shut down for lack of ideas.

[Akkori]

I didn't play BT3025 but MechWarrior 2 was the awesomest.

Yeah, I played that too. Hell, they could run *that* as an MMO. It would be like Eve on the ground. You are your mech, or something like that.

All I know is that I get tired of the fantasy crap, and since SWG won't likely ever recover, something should step up and fill the void. What they hell is it about Eleves anyway? They're all such snobs.

Is it just me, or do the "potentially" coolest MMO's come from paper & pencil RPG's?

[WayAbvPar]

Is it just me, or do the "potentially" coolest MMO's come from paper & pencil RPG's?

I think part of that is nostalgia- looking back on character concepts, adventures, etc you have had in the past. Once someone else gets the IP and starts interpreting things THEIR way, all bets are off.

Shadowbane or Cyberpunk would f'ing rule if someone had the nads to make a skill-based (NO DIKU KTHX) system.

[Kail]

Is it just me, or do the "potentially" coolest MMO's come from paper & pencil RPG's?

Implementation is key, and the implementation in most Pencil & Paper games is more open ended than the most free-form MMO could ever hope to be.  Take a Shadowrun game where you're stuck playing as one of six pregenerated characters with immutable abilities and you can only ever do two or three things as you move along a linear plot, and suddenly the setting doesn't look so interesting. 

[geldonyetich]

IMHO, the Mechwarrior that best captured that PnP Battletech vibe was number 3.  Both 2 and 4 fudged the rules pretty heavily in key places that made my Battletech nerd senses wrankle.  Granted, I was really into playing Battletech over telnet back before the turn of the century.

As for Shadowrun computerized versions, the best I've seen was the SNES version. But then, the SNES version was the only one I've seen, having not played the Genesis one.

Agreed that when it comes to taking a PNP RPG and turning it into a CRPG, implementation is definately key.  D&D games are a good example of that - you'll find them ranging some sucky to decent throughout the dozens of CRPG conversions made.

[Falconeer]

Wonder how come no one is screaming for a Call of Cthulhu MMO yet...

EDIT: Guess it'd be helluva fun playing a Deep One tho... or a Fungus from Yuggoth

[bhodi]

Wonder how come no one is screaming for a Call of Cthulhu MMO yet...

EDIT: Guess it'd be helluva fun playing a Deep One tho... or a Fungus from Yuggoth

permadeath is a bitch.

[Falconeer]

Wonder how come no one is screaming for a Call of Cthulhu MMO yet...

EDIT: Guess it'd be helluva fun playing a Deep One tho... or a Fungus from Yuggoth

permadeath is a bitch.

Heh.. not so much. It's just a matter of how many strange aeons you can wait...

[bhodi]

oh no, no I meant for the victims. Not everyone can be a Jedi Old one.