March 2003
- MMORPG/MMOG P2P design Steven J. Owens
- Dinner, Conference and BBQ J C Lawrence
- Dinner, Conference and BBQ J C Lawrence
- Wow, Jessica's working on Ac2? Chris
- Small Worlds, GDC talk Koster, Raph
- Small Worlds, GDC talk Peter Tyson
- Better Game Design through Data Mining, MDC talk David Kennerly
- MUD-Dev conference and dinner report J C Lawrence
- MUD-Dev conference and dinner report J C Lawrence
- MUD-Dev conference and dinner report Smith, David {Lynchburg}
- Fighting Lag Elia Morling
- Fighting Lag Nicolai Hansen
- Fighting Lag Daniel.Harman@barclayscapital.com
- Fighting Lag Ian Macintosh
- Fighting Lag Daniel.Harman@barclayscapital.com
- Fighting Lag Travis Nixon
- Fighting Lag Nicolai Hansen
- Fighting Lag Vladimir Vukicevic
- Fighting Lag Jo Dillon
- Fighting Lag Mike Shaver
- Fighting Lag Bruce Mitchener
- Fighting Lag Brian Hook
- Fighting Lag Paul Schwanz
- Fighting Lag Elia Morling
- Fighting Lag Ian Macintosh
- Fighting Lag ceo
- Fighting Lag arch stanton
- Fighting Lag Tom Hubina
- Fighting Lag Steven J. Owens
- Fighting Lag Amanda Walker
- A Founding Father Forgotten Scott Miller
- A Founding Father Forgotten Travis Casey
- A Founding Father Forgotten Richard Aihoshi aka Jonric
- A Founding Father Forgotten Travis Casey
- A Founding Father Forgotten Adam Dray
- A Founding Father Forgotten Travis Casey
- A Founding Father Forgotten Adam Dray
- A Founding Father Forgotten Michael Tresca
- A Founding Father Forgotten Caliban Tiresias Darklock
- A Founding Father Forgotten John Robert Arras
- A Founding Father Forgotten Michael Tresca
- A Founding Father Forgotten Matt Mihaly
- A Founding Father Forgotten Michael Chui
- A Founding Father Forgotten Matt Mihaly
- A Founding Father Forgotten Michael Tresca
- A Founding Father Forgotten Sean Kelly
- A Founding Father Forgotten Michael Tresca
- A Founding Father Forgotten Caliban Tiresias Darklock
- A Founding Father Forgotten Michael Tresca
- A Founding Father Forgotten Paul Schwanz
- A Founding Father Forgotten John Robert Arras
- A Founding Father Forgotten Thomas Tomiczek
- A Founding Father Forgotten Paul Schwanz
- A Founding Father Forgotten Ryan Arthur
- A Founding Father Forgotten Threshold RPG
- A Founding Father Forgotten David Kennerly
- A Founding Father Forgotten eck@wizards.com
- A Founding Father Forgotten Ben Hoyt
- A Founding Father Forgotten Paul Schwanz
- A Founding Father Forgotten Bad Mojo
- A Founding Father Forgotten Matt Mihaly
- MDC and talk John Robert Arras
- More on Small Worlds Koster, Raph
- More on Small Worlds Ted L. Chen
- More on Small Worlds Lee Sheldon
- More on Small Worlds Jeff Cole
- More on Small Worlds Boyle, Paul
- More on Small Worlds - Simulation of behviours in populations ceo
- BIZ: MMP subscriber numbers Daniel James
- BIZ: MMP subscriber numbers Diamonds
- BIZ: MMP subscriber numbers Chris Holko
- BIZ: MMP subscriber numbers szii@sziisoft.com
- BIZ: MMP subscriber numbers Rudy Fink
- BIZ: MMP subscriber numbers Threshold RPG
- BIZ: MMP subscriber numbers Damion Schubert
- BIZ: MMP subscriber numbers Chris
- BIZ: MMP subscriber numbers Lee Sheldon
- BIZ: MMP subscriber numbers Baar - Lord of the Seven Suns
- BIZ: MMP subscriber numbers Christopher Allen
- BIZ: MMP subscriber numbers Scott Jennings
- BIZ: MMP subscriber numbers Threshold RPG
- BIZ: MMP subscriber numbers Lee Sheldon
- Massively Multiplayer Game Development (Game Developmen t Series) Daniel.Harman@barclayscapital.com
- Massively Multiplayer Game Development (Game Developmen t Series) Jeremy Noetzelman
- Massively Multiplayer Game Development (Game Develo pment Series) Koster, Raph
- Massively Multiplayer Game Development (Game Development Series) Jessica Mulligan
- Massively Multiplayer Game Development (Game Development Series) Damion Schubert
- Massively Multiplayer Game Development (Game Developmen t Series) Ted Milker
- Winnable MMO apollyon
- Winnable MMO Edward Glowacki
- Winnable MMO Vincent Archer
- Winnable MMO kat-Zygfryd
- Winnable MMO Miroslav Silovic
- Winnable MMO eric
- Winnable MMO John Robert Arras
On Mon, 31 Mar 2003, apollyon wrote:
<snip static world problems>
> So, what if you designed an MMO that was made to be winnable?
You could. A Tale in the Desert is designed to do this:
http://www.atitd.com
But it's hard to do. ATITD has premade tasks that you have to
complete, so I'm not sure if that's what you're looking for. If
it's more like traditional fighting PvP, the closest I've come up
with is a world filled with lots of villages of creatures that the
players can attack or bring to their side. Then, once they have
enough villages, they have enough "life force" on their side that
they can regenerate in the astral plane as they fight to defeat the
demons to win the game.
> The timeframe would not be so long that people would feel as if
> they had made too great an investment to think about starting over
> again, but long enough that players could feel as if they had
> striven against a worthy opponent and would be anxious to try
> again.
It probably isn't necessary to make people start over from nothing.
Let them keep something about their character (maybe some levels or
skill levels), and with each iteration of the game, make the
"endgame" harder to achieve so that the players who have played in
previous games won't have a cakewalk while winning again. Players
should lose their possessions and buildings and other objects they
own, since the world should be rebuilt and regenerated anyway.
But, games should be set up so that newbies can "catch up" to
highlevels as time goes on anyway. So, the highlevels could keep
some of their power and the newbies would have a somewhat easier
time catching up so that they could make a difference.
> The biggest obstacle I can see to such a proposal is that it's
> risky. MMOs are expensive and no one wants to lay down that much
> money for a game that people can "beat".
Yup. Here are some other risks I see:
1. The world has to be huge to be able to absorb lots of player
actions, so I think it will have to be generated. That means it
can't be totally balanced at the start.
2. Even if you make the world and have everything set up
perfectly, the minute players come into the game, they will do bad
things to your pretty little world and your plans. By definition,
players HAVE to be able to do bad things to the world or else
their actions don't count.
3. The players won't do what you want them to do. They may decide
that they just want to sit around and pk each other and not engage
in your story. They may figure it out and decide that they don't
want to win because they'll lose their stuff. They may decide to
actively prevent others from winning. It depends on how the game
is set up. If it's set up so that you're just focused on winning
and the game itself isn't that interesting, then you may have a
higher percentage of people who try to win. OTOH, if the game is
interesting on its own, the players probably won't want it to end.
> At any rate, just some thoughts that got stirred up. Curious to
> toss them around and see what opinions people might have regarding
> the concept as a whole.
I think it's a great idea, and I've been trying to write code to do
things like this. It's just so darn hard to figure out some "goal"
that the players can achieve that is interesting enough for them to
try for, but difficult enough to get that they won't do it too
quickly. It also has to be some goal for which it makes sense that
the world is broken and everyone has to start over again. Like with
my silly demon story, why wouldn't the world just keep going after
the demons are defeated? I dunno.
I want to see how ATITD turns out. I expect that players who are
powerful will actively try to stop other players from winning as the
endgame draws near. That will hopefully lead to people having to
play a misdirection metagame where they gain as much power and
complete as many things as they can without allowing the other
powers to realize how close they are. Then, perhaps a small group
could make a push to the end to let one of their members win once
they have all they need from the larger populace. :)
John - Winnable MMO Diamonds
- Winnable MMO Threshold RPG
- Winnable MMO Vincent Archer
- Winnable MMO Diamonds
- Winnable MMO Chris Nielsen
- Winnable MMO Sara Jensen
- Winnable MMO Chris Holko
- Winnable MMO Chris Mancil
- Winnable MMO szii@sziisoft.com
- Winnable MMO Mike Shaver
- Winnable MMO Threshold RPG
- Winnable MMO shren
- Winnable MMO Threshold RPG
- Winnable MMO Matt Mihaly
- Winnable MMO Talies the Wanderer
- Winnable MMO Steven J. Owens
- Winnable MMO John Buehler
- Winnable MMO Larry Dunlap
- Winnable MMO Jonathon Duerig
- Winnable MMO ceo