The NDA went down on Champions Online, and so far the early reports from the MMO blogosphere are pretty universally negative. The sole semi-dissenter I've come across is a post by Beu over at Spouse Aggro, who points out that the game is still in beta. The problem with this counter argument, if indeed it is meant as a counter argument, is that I have never really seen a game make a major turn around during open beta. What you see is pretty close to what you will get at launch, at least for the content that they give you access to. Improvements tend to be in the area of client performance, if anywhere.
Even before this round of early reports, I found it odd that they hired Bill Roper to helm the launch of CO. Hellgate was a pretty amazing tragedy in my mind. There were a lot of great features in HL, but it got the legs kicked out from under it by a few unfathomably poor management and design decisions (but that's another post). Hiring the guy that steered that ship straight into a reef seemed (at best) a puzzling decision to me. A few months after he was hired, CO announced that you could buy a lifetime sub for $200...but only before the game launches (!?!). At that point alarm bells started going off in my head. Now that reports from the beta are coming in, color me officially skeptical.
All that said, this is a game that I've been following for more than a year. Whenever I get an opportunity to try it for free, I certainly will (I haven't yet looked into the conditions for getting into the open beta). I try never to form a firm opinion of something until I've experienced it myself. That tends to get me in to trouble a lot when I'm dining out. "Well, that's an odd sounding dish. Doesn't seem as if it would taste very good, but I'll never know if I don't try it..."
In any case, expect some impressions on CO here at some point. I sincerely hope that my skepticism is unwarranted.
Monday, August 17, 2009
Sunday, August 16, 2009
A bit of a digression
My love of MMOs definitely sprang out of my love of paper-and-pencil table-top roleplaying games. With that thin justification, I'm going to devote this entire post to my thoughts on Dungeons and Dragons 4th edition.
Despite the fact that RPG mechanics (online and offline) are a bit of an obsession with me, I didn't buy the 4th edition books when they came out. If you have moved to a new town where you haven't yet met any role-players, 36$ is a lot to spend just to grok how a system works...even if it is the newest iteration of the most popular PnP franchise. Last week Borders helpfully sent me a coupon for 40% anything in their store. That was enough of a discount to get me to at last check it out.
I won't write a detailed review. However I can say with confidence that I don't like the new system. In no particular order:
1. It is not remotely realistic. It's not as if D&D was ever one of the more "realistic" RP systems available. But 4th edition is simply way over the top. It's as if the same sensibilities that are needed for CRP or Board Game design were applied to a PnP RPG. For example, characters can regain health points a set number of times per day, regardless of class . . . or whether they even know first aid. Got stabbed in the face with a sword? No problem, think nice thoughts for five minutes and it will heal right up.
Great if your point of reference is CRPGs where being able to regen health outside of combat is standard. But completely utterly stupid if you are trying to simulate a world that is a believable fantasy infused iteration of our world.
2. It's not Dungeons and Dragons. The game is so distant from previous iterations of D&D, both in terms of both mechanics and tone/ setting, that they would have been much more honest to call it a new game.
3. It would be nearly impossible to play without miniatures. The bulk of abilities that you gain in the game reference very specific positional situations or zones of space that have no meaning if you aren't playing with miniatures on a grid based map. I guess you could argue that this takes the game back to it's roots, since grid based miniatures combat is where DnD started in the 70s. However, in my mind the reliance on maps, miniatures, and a very structured turn based combat system distances the game from the one thing that I think PnP RPGs offer that no CRPG ever could: the opportunity to be part of an engaging emergent narrative.
PnP RPGs at their best are closer to improv theater than a board game. Everyone has a personality and goals, and the fun of the game is seeing how those elements play out and interact in the situations created by the GM. The mechanics are there to help you resolve events. The mechanics enable and enhance the narrative, they do not constrain the narrative. A system that forces you to whip out miniatures and move around on a board.... is a board game first, and a RPG second.
I'm sure you could role-play with D&D 4th edition. Just as folks role-play in WoW and EQ. However, much as in an MMO, the mechanics that the game offers neither prevent nor empower that goal. D&D 4th is a board game with MMO sensibilities thinly disguised a PnP RPG.
Despite the fact that RPG mechanics (online and offline) are a bit of an obsession with me, I didn't buy the 4th edition books when they came out. If you have moved to a new town where you haven't yet met any role-players, 36$ is a lot to spend just to grok how a system works...even if it is the newest iteration of the most popular PnP franchise. Last week Borders helpfully sent me a coupon for 40% anything in their store. That was enough of a discount to get me to at last check it out.
I won't write a detailed review. However I can say with confidence that I don't like the new system. In no particular order:
1. It is not remotely realistic. It's not as if D&D was ever one of the more "realistic" RP systems available. But 4th edition is simply way over the top. It's as if the same sensibilities that are needed for CRP or Board Game design were applied to a PnP RPG. For example, characters can regain health points a set number of times per day, regardless of class . . . or whether they even know first aid. Got stabbed in the face with a sword? No problem, think nice thoughts for five minutes and it will heal right up.
Great if your point of reference is CRPGs where being able to regen health outside of combat is standard. But completely utterly stupid if you are trying to simulate a world that is a believable fantasy infused iteration of our world.
2. It's not Dungeons and Dragons. The game is so distant from previous iterations of D&D, both in terms of both mechanics and tone/ setting, that they would have been much more honest to call it a new game.
3. It would be nearly impossible to play without miniatures. The bulk of abilities that you gain in the game reference very specific positional situations or zones of space that have no meaning if you aren't playing with miniatures on a grid based map. I guess you could argue that this takes the game back to it's roots, since grid based miniatures combat is where DnD started in the 70s. However, in my mind the reliance on maps, miniatures, and a very structured turn based combat system distances the game from the one thing that I think PnP RPGs offer that no CRPG ever could: the opportunity to be part of an engaging emergent narrative.
PnP RPGs at their best are closer to improv theater than a board game. Everyone has a personality and goals, and the fun of the game is seeing how those elements play out and interact in the situations created by the GM. The mechanics are there to help you resolve events. The mechanics enable and enhance the narrative, they do not constrain the narrative. A system that forces you to whip out miniatures and move around on a board.... is a board game first, and a RPG second.
I'm sure you could role-play with D&D 4th edition. Just as folks role-play in WoW and EQ. However, much as in an MMO, the mechanics that the game offers neither prevent nor empower that goal. D&D 4th is a board game with MMO sensibilities thinly disguised a PnP RPG.
Sunday, August 9, 2009
Three obscure innovations I wish MMO designers would steal
Apologies for the lack of posts, RL has been a demanding (but rewarding) mistress of late.
On to the topic. I've played a lot of MMOs over the years, and it seems that all too often nice features are buried in obscure or mediocre products. In no particular order, these are my personal top three.
1. Procedural Quest Generators (Anarchy Online): SWG had something similar, but no MMO that I have tried had a random quest generator as deep as the one used in Anarchy Online. There were a series of sliders so that you could adjust the missions for your class, playstyle, and party size. To give one example, by adjusting the sliders you could generate missions that were combat heavy "break down the door and shoot everyone that moves" missions or missions where you could win by stealthing past everyone and stealing an item. Once you had the mission parameters set the way that you liked them, you could randomly generate missions over and over until you got one with a quest reward that was useful to you.
The brilliance of the system was that it provided unlimited content that players themselves balanced to their tastes, rather than forcing some designer to guess what the players will want. The missions did get repetitive eventually, it's nothing you'd want to hinge your MMO on. However, adding that sort of system to a game that already has a deep scripted questing environment would definitely add a ton of value to an MMO, and with a lot less developer overhead than creating new zones or quest hubs. When I played Anarchy Online I got a solid month of entertainment out the mission generator.
2. Flexible yet Simple Crafting (EQOA): It seems that in most MMOs, either your crafting is limited to predefined recipes or the crafting system is way way too deep to be entertaining for casual players. The sole exception that I am aware of is Everquest Online Adventures. Crafted items had base stats like AC or DPS. The other properties of an item were determined by the gems you included while crafting an item. Gems could add to any base stats, and could also add properties like offensive procs on weapons and defensive procs on armor. Instead of hunting around for a recipe that made a good item for a given character build, you simply designed it. Want a full set of Intelligence plate-mail for some insane reason? Just make it. Remarkably, the system for crafting was actually no more difficult to figure out than something like WoW or LoTRO. Assemble ingredients and hit a button.
3. Diablo Style Endgame (Phantasy Star Online): In Phantasy Star Online, once you reached a certain level you gained access to new dungeons where mobs could drop the highest level loot. Admittedly they weren't really new areas, but the same areas that you had been adventuring in with new monsters that behaved differently and had different resistances. However, either solo or in four man parties, the eight "final dungeons" were extremely addictive to play through. Loot was completely randomized, and the best items were fantastically rare (1% or less drop rates rare).
At first gear drops that were enormous upgrades would come quickly. However, once your gear hit a certain threshold the odds of getting an upgrade on any given run was pretty low. Despite this, PSO kept me playing in the "endgame" longer than almost any other MMO I've tried. I literally put in hundreds of hours into the final dungeon tier, and to this day I still play offline occasionally. The "maybe I'll get something this time!" mechanic is extremely addictive.
What I really liked was that the endgame supported both casual and hardcore playstyles. It rewarded casual players by being accessible solo. However, it also rewarded the super-hardcore because they were far more likely to have stumbled across the best gear. I find it a bit mystifying that Diablo/ Rogue style dungeon mechanics don't appear in more MMOs (Dungeon Runners excepted).
On to the topic. I've played a lot of MMOs over the years, and it seems that all too often nice features are buried in obscure or mediocre products. In no particular order, these are my personal top three.
1. Procedural Quest Generators (Anarchy Online): SWG had something similar, but no MMO that I have tried had a random quest generator as deep as the one used in Anarchy Online. There were a series of sliders so that you could adjust the missions for your class, playstyle, and party size. To give one example, by adjusting the sliders you could generate missions that were combat heavy "break down the door and shoot everyone that moves" missions or missions where you could win by stealthing past everyone and stealing an item. Once you had the mission parameters set the way that you liked them, you could randomly generate missions over and over until you got one with a quest reward that was useful to you.
The brilliance of the system was that it provided unlimited content that players themselves balanced to their tastes, rather than forcing some designer to guess what the players will want. The missions did get repetitive eventually, it's nothing you'd want to hinge your MMO on. However, adding that sort of system to a game that already has a deep scripted questing environment would definitely add a ton of value to an MMO, and with a lot less developer overhead than creating new zones or quest hubs. When I played Anarchy Online I got a solid month of entertainment out the mission generator.
2. Flexible yet Simple Crafting (EQOA): It seems that in most MMOs, either your crafting is limited to predefined recipes or the crafting system is way way too deep to be entertaining for casual players. The sole exception that I am aware of is Everquest Online Adventures. Crafted items had base stats like AC or DPS. The other properties of an item were determined by the gems you included while crafting an item. Gems could add to any base stats, and could also add properties like offensive procs on weapons and defensive procs on armor. Instead of hunting around for a recipe that made a good item for a given character build, you simply designed it. Want a full set of Intelligence plate-mail for some insane reason? Just make it. Remarkably, the system for crafting was actually no more difficult to figure out than something like WoW or LoTRO. Assemble ingredients and hit a button.
3. Diablo Style Endgame (Phantasy Star Online): In Phantasy Star Online, once you reached a certain level you gained access to new dungeons where mobs could drop the highest level loot. Admittedly they weren't really new areas, but the same areas that you had been adventuring in with new monsters that behaved differently and had different resistances. However, either solo or in four man parties, the eight "final dungeons" were extremely addictive to play through. Loot was completely randomized, and the best items were fantastically rare (1% or less drop rates rare).
At first gear drops that were enormous upgrades would come quickly. However, once your gear hit a certain threshold the odds of getting an upgrade on any given run was pretty low. Despite this, PSO kept me playing in the "endgame" longer than almost any other MMO I've tried. I literally put in hundreds of hours into the final dungeon tier, and to this day I still play offline occasionally. The "maybe I'll get something this time!" mechanic is extremely addictive.
What I really liked was that the endgame supported both casual and hardcore playstyles. It rewarded casual players by being accessible solo. However, it also rewarded the super-hardcore because they were far more likely to have stumbled across the best gear. I find it a bit mystifying that Diablo/ Rogue style dungeon mechanics don't appear in more MMOs (Dungeon Runners excepted).
Friday, July 17, 2009
A fantastic MMO review
Really seriously a must read review of Darkfall. At Eurogamer of all places. The bit towards the end where the reviewer steps out and gives his thoughts on the entire practice of reviewing MMOs I especially enjoyed.
On Darkfall, it's absolutely not the kind of game I'd get into. Nothing infuriates me more than clunky controls, and even reviews from screaming fanboys make the controls sound clunky. Yeah I guess I'd get used to them eventually. But I could also get used to being blind and crippled. Doesn't mean I'd like to. Further, every single review I have read makes it sound raising your skills is tortuously slow. No thanks.
On Darkfall, it's absolutely not the kind of game I'd get into. Nothing infuriates me more than clunky controls, and even reviews from screaming fanboys make the controls sound clunky. Yeah I guess I'd get used to them eventually. But I could also get used to being blind and crippled. Doesn't mean I'd like to. Further, every single review I have read makes it sound raising your skills is tortuously slow. No thanks.
Thursday, July 9, 2009
A-teams, live teams, and LoTRO
In the comments to a post over at Kill Ten Rats, Psychochild linked this article at Elder Game. It's a great read, and I think it yields some insight into what we are seeing in LoTRO right now.
There has been a noticeable shift in design philosophy in LoTRO since MoM launched. The most visible culprit being the radiance system. There have also been a lot of odd experiments, some of which worked out well (e.g., letting designers from DDO create new three man instances that feature puzzles) and some of which frankly haven’t (e.g., the first iteration of the Lothlorian gift box system). We are also seeing a lot more bugs creep into patches than we are used too. Finally, we know that Turbine has gotten a lot of outside funding for one or two “secret projects” that they are going full steam ahead on.
All of these observations indicate that a new team is likely in charge of LoTRO these days, and that the "A team" that designed it is off doing something else. It's also very likely that some of the more experienced "live team" devs from DDO have been been brought over to try and take up slack from the departure of the A team. As an aside, the major revamp of DDO that is underway also implies that fresh blood is likely in charge of that product these days.
I don't see the fact that a new team is running the show as a bad thing in of itself. It does mean that we are likely going to continue to see surprising design decisions come down the pipe, as well as slightly buggier patches than we got in the SoA days. However, bugs in patches don't bother me as long as they get fixed quickly. And surprises can be good or bad.
Wednesday, July 8, 2009
Hostility Towards Raiders
This post about raiding over at Clockwork Gamer is a pretty good summary of why I don't enjoy raiding. It also attracted an insanely judgmental comment from some random poster. The basic gist of the comment was that all hardcore raiders are utter losers that need to get a life.
I don't agree with that at all. MMOs are a huge time sink regardless. I don't think that whether you spend that time raiding, solo questing, or in a crafting hall really changes it. However, the overt hostility towards raiders was interesting to me. It's something you see a lot on message boards and blogs. Now please indulge me while I ramble for a bit....
I personally am not much of a raider. I like to see a raid once or twice, but I don't enjoy doing them anywhere near enough to gear myself and 11-39 of my "closest friends." I'm the guy that will occasionally go on a raid if the guild needs an extra DPS and I happen to be on. I'll have solid gear, but not the best (because, you know, I don't raid). I'm also perfectly happy not to roll on anything. I'm not one of the loonies trying to gear up for raid x in a series of y after all (and to my tastes they are loonies).
However, I also fail to see any reason to get belligerent with others that do enjoy serious raiding. Just because I don't enjoy something doesn't mean that it sucks, or that people who like it must suck. If you enjoy playing a "game" with that kind of focus, more power to you. I certainly put more hours than it takes to raid into much more inane activities when I was a lad (becoming good enough at Super Mario Brothers II to consistently go through the game with any of the four characters the long hard way without dying a single time comes to mind...).
So, where is this hostility towards raiders coming from? It's something you see over and over in "raiders versus casuals" debates on the internet. Raiders usually seem to assume that it's just sour grapes from players that aren't willing to put in the work to get "phat lewts." However, I think it's a little more than that. I'll use WoW as an example, but these comments could apply just as well to EQ or any number of other MMOs that have raid focused end games.
I hit the cap twice in WoW, once at 60 and once at 70. And both times the game fell flat on it's face for me because Raiding was the main activity I was being pushed towards by the game design. Each time I felt betrayed by the designers. The casual friendly game I knew suddenly dried up, and the bulk of the remaining content was for a play style I had neither the spare time nor the desire to seriously engage in.
However, I didn't head out onto the internet with a torch and a pitchfork when it happened. I recognized that I was clearly not the target audience for the existing end game, and voted with my wallet. When a game that did actually have an end game that was enjoyable to my tastes came along, I also voted with my wallet (I've spent more time and money on LoTRO now than any previous MMO).
I can also see where hitting a brick wall at the level cap might not effect everyone the same way as me (shocking!). If you are the kind of simian that hangs out on most message boards, and you hit an endgame that says "screw you casual boy!" in big red letters, it probably seems logical to blame it on whatever market segment the endgame does cater to. Thus you end up with random idgits that troll the web posting "Raiders are teh suxxors! Get a damn life!" every time someone posts on a blog or message board about what "serious business" raiding is.
They aren't jealous of raiders and their gear/ dedication/ spare time. At least not directly. They are jealous and upset that the endgame of WoW, EQ, or whatever MMO caters to raiders instead of them.
I don't agree with that at all. MMOs are a huge time sink regardless. I don't think that whether you spend that time raiding, solo questing, or in a crafting hall really changes it. However, the overt hostility towards raiders was interesting to me. It's something you see a lot on message boards and blogs. Now please indulge me while I ramble for a bit....
I personally am not much of a raider. I like to see a raid once or twice, but I don't enjoy doing them anywhere near enough to gear myself and 11-39 of my "closest friends." I'm the guy that will occasionally go on a raid if the guild needs an extra DPS and I happen to be on. I'll have solid gear, but not the best (because, you know, I don't raid). I'm also perfectly happy not to roll on anything. I'm not one of the loonies trying to gear up for raid x in a series of y after all (and to my tastes they are loonies).
However, I also fail to see any reason to get belligerent with others that do enjoy serious raiding. Just because I don't enjoy something doesn't mean that it sucks, or that people who like it must suck. If you enjoy playing a "game" with that kind of focus, more power to you. I certainly put more hours than it takes to raid into much more inane activities when I was a lad (becoming good enough at Super Mario Brothers II to consistently go through the game with any of the four characters the long hard way without dying a single time comes to mind...).
So, where is this hostility towards raiders coming from? It's something you see over and over in "raiders versus casuals" debates on the internet. Raiders usually seem to assume that it's just sour grapes from players that aren't willing to put in the work to get "phat lewts." However, I think it's a little more than that. I'll use WoW as an example, but these comments could apply just as well to EQ or any number of other MMOs that have raid focused end games.
I hit the cap twice in WoW, once at 60 and once at 70. And both times the game fell flat on it's face for me because Raiding was the main activity I was being pushed towards by the game design. Each time I felt betrayed by the designers. The casual friendly game I knew suddenly dried up, and the bulk of the remaining content was for a play style I had neither the spare time nor the desire to seriously engage in.
However, I didn't head out onto the internet with a torch and a pitchfork when it happened. I recognized that I was clearly not the target audience for the existing end game, and voted with my wallet. When a game that did actually have an end game that was enjoyable to my tastes came along, I also voted with my wallet (I've spent more time and money on LoTRO now than any previous MMO).
I can also see where hitting a brick wall at the level cap might not effect everyone the same way as me (shocking!). If you are the kind of simian that hangs out on most message boards, and you hit an endgame that says "screw you casual boy!" in big red letters, it probably seems logical to blame it on whatever market segment the endgame does cater to. Thus you end up with random idgits that troll the web posting "Raiders are teh suxxors! Get a damn life!" every time someone posts on a blog or message board about what "serious business" raiding is.
They aren't jealous of raiders and their gear/ dedication/ spare time. At least not directly. They are jealous and upset that the endgame of WoW, EQ, or whatever MMO caters to raiders instead of them.
Thursday, July 2, 2009
Video games in ..1958?!?
Stumbled upon a very interesting article today. Not exactly massive, but apparently the first (or 2nd?) multiplayer "video game" was designed for oscilloscopes in 1958. The first networked computer game with avatars and in game chat was another one that I've never heard of called Maze War. It dates back to 1973 (!).
The video of the oscilloscope game is labeled "the second ever computer game." This doesn't seem technically correct since it's not on a computer. And I really have to wonder what the "first ever computer game" was (and was it for oscilloscopes? televisions? slide rulers?). Of the games on that site, Space War was the only one I had heard of before yesterday.
The video of the oscilloscope game is labeled "the second ever computer game." This doesn't seem technically correct since it's not on a computer. And I really have to wonder what the "first ever computer game" was (and was it for oscilloscopes? televisions? slide rulers?). Of the games on that site, Space War was the only one I had heard of before yesterday.
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