January 2005
- Homogeneity and choice (Was DESIGN: Why do people like weather in MMORPGs?) Mike Rozak
- [SPAM] DESIGN: Why do people like weather in MMORPGs? Dana V. Baldwin
- Homogeneity and choice (Was DESIGN: Why do people like weather in MMORPGs?) Mike Rozak
- Homogeneity and choice (Was DESIGN: Why do people like weather in MMORPGs?) John Buehler
- Homogeneity and choice (Was DESIGN: Why do people like weather in MMORPGs?) Mike Rozak
- Homogeneity and choice (Was DESIGN: Why do people like weather in MMORPGs?) John Buehler
- Homogeneity and choice (Was DESIGN: Why do people like weather in MMORPGs?) Mike Rozak
- Homogeneity and choice (Was DESIGN: Why do people like weather in MMORPGs?) John Buehler
- Homogeneity and choice (Was DESIGN: Why do people like weather in MMORPGs?) Wayne Witzke
- Homogeneity and choice (Was DESIGN: Why do people likeweather in MMORPGs?) Corey Cauble
- Homogeneity and choice (Was DESIGN: Why do people likeweather in MMORPGs?) HRose
- Focus vs. Scope (WAS: Homogeneity and choice) cruise
- Focus vs. Scope (WAS: Homogeneity and choice) Michael Sellers
- Focus vs. Scope (WAS: Homogeneity and choice) P J
- Attractive Grouping (Was: Focus vs. Scope) cruise
- Attractive Grouping (Was: Focus vs. Scope) John Buehler
- Attractive Grouping (Was: Focus vs. Scope) cruise
- Attractive Grouping (Was: Focus vs. Scope) John Buehler
- Attractive Grouping (Was: Focus vs. Scope) cruise
- Attractive Grouping (Was: Focus vs. Scope) John Buehler
- Attractive Grouping (Was: Focus vs. Scope) Ling Lo
- Focus vs. Scope (WAS: Homogeneity and choice) HRose
- Homogeneity and choice Eric Random
- Homogeneity and choice (Was DESIGN: Why do people likeweather in MMORPGs?) Koster, Raph
- Homogeneity and choice (Was DESIGN: Why do people likeweather in MMORPGs?) Damion Schubert
- Wish cancelled... Eric Scholten
- New job...Alternate Reality Games Adam
- Wish cancelled... Artur Biesiadowski
- MMORPG Cancellations of the past 2 Years Michael Hartman
- MMORPG Cancellations of the past 2 Years Mike Rozak
- ***SPAM*** Homogeneity and choice (Was DESIGN: Why do people like weather in MMORPGs?) Miroslav Silovic
- [Media] A WoW stats web site Mike Rozak
- [Media] A WoW stats web site Zak Jensen
- weapon choices (was DESIGN: Why do people likeweather in MMORPGs?) Tom Hunter
- weapon choices (was DESIGN: Why do people likeweather in MMORPGs?) Amanda Walker
- weapon choices Matthew D. Fuller
- weapon choices Tom Hunter
- weapon choices cruise
- weapon choices (was DESIGN: Why do peoplelikeweather in MMORPGs?) Matt Mihaly
- weapon choices (was DESIGN: Why do people likeweather in MMORPGs?) Douglas Goodall
- Alternative team based approaches to game-play olag@ifi.uio.no
- Alternative team based approaches to game-play ceo
- Alternative team based approaches to game-play olag@ifi.uio.no
- Alternative team based approaches to game-play Mike Oxford
- Alternative team based approaches to game-play Johan A
- Alternative team based approaches to game-play olag@ifi.uio.no
- Alternative team based approaches to game-play Vincent Archer
- Alternative team based approaches to game-play Johan A
- Alternative team based approaches to game-play cruise
- Alternative team based approaches to game-play Johan A
- Alternative team based approaches to game-play Damion Schubert
- Alternative team based approaches to game-play cruise
- Alternative team based approaches to game-play Zach Collins (Siege)
- Alternative team based approaches to game-play Douglas Goodall
- MMO Quest: Why they're still lousy Sporky McBeard
- MMO Quest: Why they're still lousy Miroslav Silovic
- MMO Quest: Why they're still lousy Michael Hartman
Sporky McBeard wrote:
> You want to "fix" MMORPG quests. Here's what needs to happen:
I disagree with almost all of your points to varying degrees of
intensity.
> 1) Dump the story crap - Nobody reads that stuff, nobody
> cares. They see "Find 12 Bloody Monkey Paws" and skip the rest.
Wrong. Horribly, short sightedly, wrong.
There are actually a lot of people who read the stuff and derive a
lot of enjoyment from that part of the quests. I can give you a
perfect example of varying ranges of "caring" from my own 3 person
group in WoW (me, my wife, and a RL friend).
My wife could care less about the story. She wants to get on with
the action and the phat lewt.
I like a good story, but sometimes when I am motivated towards a
goal (like a major level or a good reward) I won't read the junk.
Our friend has to read EVERYTHING. If we try to nudge him along he
gets very unhappy.
I've seen these kinds of ranges in my own games and in every game I
have played. Some people love the story and would be absolutely
bored to tears if the story did not exist.
> 2) Change the world - MMORPG quests are fundamentally flawed in
> that they cannot change the world.
This point I agree with. This is a weakness of MMORPGs. This is also
something that is a lot harder to do in graphical games.
You should really try out some text games. In many of those, players
can dramatically change the world through quests.
> 3) Change the missions - Players go through the exact same
> motions with every quest as just about every other
> player. Something like Thottbot allows other players to look up
> the locations and goals that other players had already
> discovered. Personally, I think that instance missions are the
> answer here, because you can modify the mission based on the
> player.
Instanced missions have their place- they prevent having to watch
the Uber Evil Bad Guy you just killed respawn. But they are not in
and of themselves the answer and overuse of instances has a severe
negative aspect of the MM part of an MMORPG.
> 4) Allow certain players to create their own quests - I think it
> would be pretty nifty for a player to post a mission saying that
> they need X number of monkey paws and that they'll pay Y dollars
> for it.
Not a bad idea, but really not a very effective one. Players can
already do this through interaction. Perhaps a formally coded method
might help, but I suspect the impact of this would be minimal.
> 5) Allow certain players to create their own dungeons - I promise
> you that players are far more creative than most MMORPGs give
> them credit for.
I can assure you that the majority of players are LESS creative than
you think and will create such inane filth that it will actually
cheapen your game and damage your gaming environment.
You might say "Yeah, but find the good ones." Good luck with that.
Modding works because the mods just float on the internet and do not
get implemented unless someone chooses to. Also, moddable non-MMORPG
games don't need to maintain consistency. Nobody thinks badly about
Quake 3 because they played one mod that was sci-fi and the next one
was fantasyish. There is no expectation of consistency or even
balance.
In an MMORPG, areas/zones need to have a logical reason for existing
and there has to be some kind of world
justification/consistency. Also, they need to be balanced (VERY
HARD), they need to NOT violate other people's trademarks/IP, and
they need to not suck. A few areas with tons of typos, idiotic
design, etc. will make your entire game look bad.
> 6) Dump the quests altogether - I mean, what purpose do quests
> really serve.
Perhaps this one sums up why so many of the above suggestions are
bad ones. It sounds like YOU don't really like quests and just churn
through them for the rewards. That's fine. That is why no game
should REQUIRE questing (WoW requires a few painful quests just to
get core class abilities, for example).
But don't let the fact that you clearly dislike quests bias you
towards them entirely. There are certainly ways to make them better,
but dumping them or dumping the story are not two good suggestions.
--
Michael Hartman
President and CEO, Threshold Virtual Environments, Inc.
http://www.thresholdrpg.com - MMO Quest: Why they're still lousy Sporky McBeard
- MMO Quest: Why they're still lousy Mike Shaver
- MMO Quest: Why they're still lousy Vincent Archer
- MMO Quest: Why they're still lousy Michael Hartman
- MMO Quest: Why they're still lousy Sporky McBeard
- MMO Quest: Why they're still lousy Paul Schwanz
- MMO Quest: Why they're still lousy Bart Simon
- MMO Quest: Why they're still lousy Jon Mayo
- MMO Quest: Why they're still lousy Byron Ellacott
- MMO Quest: Why they're still lousy David Kennerly
- MMO Quest: Why they're still lousy Paul Schwanz
- MMO Quest: Why they're still lousy David Kennerly
- MMO Quest: Why they're still lousy Miroslav Silovic
- MMO Quest: Why they're still lousy Roger Hicks
- MMO Quest: Why they're still lousy Paul Schwanz
- MMO Quest: Why they're still lousy Douglas Goodall
- MMO Quest: Why they're still lousy Sporky McBeard
- MMO Quest: Why they're still lousy Douglas Goodall
- MMO Quest: Why they're still lousy Mike Rozak
- MMO Quest: Why they're still lousy olag@ifi.uio.no
- MMO Quest: Why they're still lousy Mark Mensch
- MMO Quest: Why they're still lousy Vincent Archer
- [bus][des] Anarchy Online and the free MMORPG... ceo
- [bus][des] Anarchy Online and the free MMORPG... Tess Snider
- [bus][des] Anarchy Online and the free MMORPG... Vladimir Cole
- [bus][des] Anarchy Online and the free MMORPG... Mike Oxford
- [bus][des] Anarchy Online and the free MMORPG... Douglas Goodall
- [bus][des] Anarchy Online and the free MMORPG... olag@ifi.uio.no
- [bus][des] Anarchy Online and the free MMORPG... Johan A
- [bus][des] Anarchy Online and the free MMORPG... Tess Snider
- [bus][des] Anarchy Online and the free MMORPG... Douglas Goodall
- [bus][des] Anarchy Online and the free MMORPG... Douglas Goodall
- [bus][des] Anarchy Online and the free MMORPG... ceo
- [bus][des] Anarchy Online and the free MMORPG... Douglas Goodall
- realistic combat vs enjoyable combat Rayzam
- realistic combat vs enjoyable combat Tom Hunter
- realistic combat vs enjoyable combat Michael Sellers
- realistic combat vs enjoyable combat olag@ifi.uio.no
- realistic combat vs enjoyable combat Darkwolf
- realistic combat vs enjoyable combat olag@ifi.uio.no
- realistic combat vs enjoyable combat Rayzam
- realistic combat vs enjoyable combat Jon Monteleone
- Homogeneity and choice Mike Rozak
- Homogeneity and choice Paolo Piselli
- Homogeneity and choice Sporky McBeard
- DESIGN: IGDA Persistent Worlds White Paper Alistair Milne
- DESIGN: IGDA Persistent Worlds White Paper Daniel James
- DESIGN: WoW quests and content Mike Rozak
- DESIGN: WoW quests and content Sporky McBeard
- DESIGN: WoW quests and content Kiztent Hatepriest
- DESIGN: WoW quests and content Amanda Walker
- DESIGN: WoW quests and content Greg Titus
- DESIGN: WoW quests and content Travis Nixon
- DESIGN: WoW quests and content cruise
- DESIGN: WoW quests and content Michael Hartman
- [SPAM] DESIGN: WoW quests and content Dana V. Baldwin
- DESIGN: WoW quests and content Edward Glowacki
- DESIGN: WoW quests and content Michael Hartman
- DESIGN: WoW quests and content Mike Rozak
- DESIGN: WoW quests and content Byron Ellacott
- DESIGN: WoW quests and content Johan A
- DESIGN: WoW quests and content logic@jrlogic.dyndns.org
- DESIGN: WoW quests and content olag@ifi.uio.no
- DESIGN: WoW quests and content Damion Schubert
- DESIGN: WoW quests and content Johan A
- DESIGN: WoW quests and content Mike Shaver
- DESIGN: WoW quests and content Byron Ellacott
- DESIGN: WoW quests and content Michael Hartman
- DESIGN: WoW quests and content John Buehler
- DESIGN: WoW quests and content Jim Purbrick
- DESIGN: WoW quests and content David Kennerly
- DESIGN: WoW quests and content Chris
- DESIGN: WoW quests and content P J
- DESIGN: WoW quests and content Douglas Goodall
- DESIGN: WoW quests and content Damion Schubert
- DESIGN: WoW quests and content Yannick Jean
- MUD-Dev Digest, Vol 20, Issue 15 Dread Quixadhal
- DESIGN: Study of MMORPG/MUD friendliness Mike Rozak
- DESIGN: Study of MMORPG/MUD friendliness Johan A
- DESIGN: Study of MMORPG/MUD friendliness Spot
- DESIGN: Study of MMORPG/MUD friendliness Bob Kovalchick
- DESIGN: Study of MMORPG/MUD friendliness Sean Howard
- DESIGN: Study of MMORPG/MUD friendliness Mike Rozak
- DESIGN: Study of MMORPG/MUD friendliness Brett Bibby
- MUD-Dev Digest, Vol 20, Issue 16 Dread Quixadhal
- MUD-Dev Digest, Vol 20, Issue 16 Vincent Archer
- MUD-Dev Digest, Vol 20, Issue 16 Mike Shaver
- WoW and humor Amanda Walker
- WoW and humor Vincent Archer
- WoW and humor Mike Oxford
- MUD-Dev Digest, Vol 20, Issue 16 Michael Hartman
- MUD-Dev Digest, Vol 20, Issue 16 Kiztent Hatepriest
- MUD-Dev Digest, Vol 20, Issue 16 Michael Hartman
- D&D Online Level Limit Thoughts Greg B
- D&D Online Level Limit Thoughts Byron Ellacott
- D&D Online Level Limit Thoughts Grimwell
- FW: DESIGN: Study of MMORPG/MUD friendliness Lisa Galarneau
- FW: DESIGN: Study of MMORPG/MUD friendliness Ben Carter
- FW: DESIGN: Study of MMORPG/MUD friendliness Vincent Archer