EQ Never

Tol_sl

shitlord
759
0
I could see myself using a fast forward button in a lot of games. Especially grind-heavy rpgs where I hate the combat system, but I've already played 25 hours so I can't just quit without feeling annoyed that I didn't see the ending. I'm playing persona now and I just kind of groan every time I have to go back into the dungeon to trek the samey hallways of menu-battler hell.
 

etchazz

Trakanon Raider
2,707
1,056
I could see myself using a fast forward button in a lot of games. Especially grind-heavy rpgs where I hate the combat system, but I've already played 25 hours so I can't just quit without feeling annoyed that I didn't see the ending. I'm playing persona now and I just kind of groan every time I have to go back into the dungeon to trek the samey hallways of menu-battler hell.
"you just yadda yadda'd the best part!"
 

tad10

Elisha Dushku
5,534
601
Imagine being a huge fan, and finding out someone who is working on your games doesn't even like them.
What's amazing is that she is not unique. There are a lot of people in the video game industry who aren't gamers but are there because that's the job they ended up with out of college for some reason. I don't understand it myself.
 

Convo

Ahn'Qiraj Raider
8,792
664
What's amazing is that she is not unique. There are a lot of people in the video game industry who aren't gamers but are there because that's the job they ended up with out of college for some reason. I don't understand it myself.
That's a big issue.. There are people working on games that have no passion for it. Just like there are probably people working on IPs like EQ that really don't know much about its roots. We are fucked until a small team dreams big.
 

Quaid

Trump's Staff
11,859
8,265
I'm not sure there is an industry where this isn't an issue... no surprise it exists in gaming.
 

Lleauaric

Sparkletot Monger
4,058
1,822
Doesn't PS2 have a sub model? Anyone? Bueler?
Yep. They have one. You get increased resource regen, about 48 certs a day, and access to a few cosmetic items in the station. They have about 4 tiers of this. Think the final one is auraxium at like 15/mo.

Nothing in it p2w though. Stock guns are pretty much the top. And you can buy anything with certs... Except cosmetic items. The most any gun costs is 1000 certs which you can get in a couple/three days without too much effort if running with a good platoon.

The model they have said they like for ps2 is that the free customers are content for the paying customers.. It works out pretty well and they have done really well avoiding a p2w situation. Except in cases where a guy with a shitty computer gets in a draw down with a guy with a great computer... But what fps has solved that one?

As far as game designers who don't game.. Product is all that matters to me. Reminds me of the old myth. "Never eat food from a skinny chef". (<cough>Thomas Keller<cough>)
 

Mr Creed

Too old for this shit
2,395
289
Doesn't PS2 have a sub model? Anyone? Bueler?
PS2 has a sub model. The benefits are increased xp gain (always nice) and increased resource gain (never felt this is that useful, a bit more due to recent changes but generally unless you blow up your tanks within a minute of acquiring them it matters little) and a second deal of the day (they offer a random shop item for half every day to anyone, and a different one for half only for subscribers). What PS2 does not have is a lockout for weapons or vehicles that requires a subscription like many MMOs seems to have for raid loot tiers. the only shop-only items are skins, different hats, camo etc.

All said I never felt the need to subscribe to PS2 and prefered to cherry pick my purchases to fit my playstyle and use the certs for upgrades. The bonuses are ok but not overpowered. I expect the same for EQ really, although I'm at a loss how they can weave such advantages into the systems we expect. I would not be happy about say tier 5 loot being sub only.

One area where I've always disagreed with Zehn and others is that I believe you can mix hardcore and casual elements in a game. An example I'd use is this: allow players to choose one of three XP curves when leveling - a 10% faster leveling but subject to corpse runs and XP loss, including de-leveling. Normal leveling, no corpse runs but XP loss/XP debt (no deleveling) and -10% slower leveling but no corpse runs or XP loss on death.

You can "Play your way" but playing your way has some consequences. Similiarly, I don't mind class switching, but with consequences. Same sort of thing. You can start a class with no class switching allowed for a 10% XP boost. You can start a class that allows class switching but you lose 50% of your accumulated XP/Levels (so if you're a 50 Ranger and switch to SK you start as a 25 SK) for normal IP. Or you can start a class that allows class switching and you only lose 25% of your level but at a -10% XP costs.

Numbers are just arbitrary for the purposes of this post.
I would hate such a system if it was used on the same server. I find it perfect for different servers though, imo MMOs that are designed to run many servers concurrently need to look towards niches like that.
 

iannis

Musty Nester
31,351
17,660
MMO devs manage to show pretty consistently that they have enough trouble managing one ruleset, much less creating a game which could allow for multiple rulesets over multiple servers. They just don't think that way and for whatever reason (a few of them might even be decent budgetary / divergent patching types of reasons) they won't ever do that.

By "they" I mean the big MMO houses.

It's a great idea, but I do think that if it was a monetarily practical idea MMOs would be growing that way instead of pay to generate your own content layered on top of over-reaching piles of trivially mix/maxed uninspired bloat.

Divergent ruleset servers is basically just a moderated, graphic mudportal.net
 

gogojira_sl

shitlord
2,202
3
The issue with Jennifer Hepler is that a bunch of psychos don't know the difference between criticizing someone's work and disrupting people's personal lives. Anyone who thinks sending death threats to her, her family, making sick calls or writing disgusting letters is justified because she wrote a story they didn't like is a fucking lunatic. Anyone with a "get over it, we all have shitty days at work" mentality would be on the floor weeping if this shit happened to them. But gamers, man, we sure do know how to act like a bunch of dipshits.
 

Quaid

Trump's Staff
11,859
8,265
The issue with Jennifer Hepler is that a bunch of psychos don't know the difference between criticizing someone's work and disrupting people's personal lives. Anyone who thinks sending death threats to her, her family, making sick calls or writing disgusting letters is justified because she wrote a story they didn't like is a fucking lunatic. Anyone with a "get over it, we all have shitty days at work" mentality would be on the floor weeping if this shit happened to them. But gamers, man, we sure do know how to act like a bunch of dipshits.
If I changed the menu at the restaurant, and a regular/critic was displeased, and responded to me with the level of abuse gaming devs receive... I may do something less than civilized to them in retaliation.
 

Caeden

Golden Baronet of the Realm
7,774
13,058
The issue with Jennifer Hepler is that a bunch of psychos don't know the difference between criticizing someone's work and disrupting people's personal lives. Anyone who thinks sending death threats to her, her family, making sick calls or writing disgusting letters is justified because she wrote a story they didn't like is a fucking lunatic. Anyone with a "get over it, we all have shitty days at work" mentality would be on the floor weeping if this shit happened to them. But gamers, man, we sure do know how to act like a bunch of dipshits.
There are ways of handling this sanely and like a semi-decent person. Most gamers are fucking incapable of it. Read any Dev's twitter responses etc. 90% are just ad hominem attacks because frankly, most gamers are raging, entitled douchebags. Was Hepler awful? Sure. Could she probably write a decent story for a game? Maybe. Should she be designing? No fucking way. I used to think I'd love to do game design, now I think no fucking way. Gamers seem to be the one place where its the vocal majority instead of the vocal minority. Psycho is the rule.

She's like the patent lawyers, technical writers, etc that I work with. None have a BURNING fucking desire for the chemical industry but they can do their aspect competently and like making money themselves.

Edit: Also Hepler is a lot like the billion of other self-proclaimed "nerdy" english degree majors who thought they were going to be the next great Emily Bronte, Tolkien, or Shakespeare. Here's a bit of free wisdom that got me black listed by my ex wife's english teacher cousin (who has a Master's in literature) who bitched about her salary: Never do for a living what others do better than you as a hobby.
 

Caeden

Golden Baronet of the Realm
7,774
13,058
If I changed the menu at the restaurant, and a regular/critic was displeased, and responded to me with the level of abuse gaming devs receive... I may do something less than civilized to them in retaliation.
 

Caliane

Avatar of War Slayer
15,951
12,614
The issue with Jennifer Hepler is that a bunch of psychos don't know the difference between criticizing someone's work and disrupting people's personal lives. Anyone who thinks sending death threats to her, her family, making sick calls or writing disgusting letters is justified because she wrote a story they didn't like is a fucking lunatic. Anyone with a "get over it, we all have shitty days at work" mentality would be on the floor weeping if this shit happened to them. But gamers, man, we sure do know how to act like a bunch of dipshits.
But its the same shit as with phil fish. When you antagonize the hate machine, it just escalates. When you are dumb enough to think you can out argue 2000 anonymous internet assholes, you are going to get burned badly.
(Although, I can't remember if she did directly make responses, or if it was just entirely dumb shit she said in interviews, that was used against her.)

We get the same thing in comics of course. There is no "public relations" course in art schools, or required reading to publish works. Alot of creators just have no idea how to deal with the public. Fans or haters.

Utter naivety to expect the world to sit around singing songs and holding hands. People say cruel shit on purpose to piss you off, belittle, and terrorize.
When you put yourself out there to the public, you get both sides.
At least games/comics are not getting stalked by paparazzi.

Can you even imagine the shit Justin Bieber puts up with? or wonder why Spears, Lohans, etc lose their minds?
 

Silence_sl

shitlord
2,459
5
That's what should happen to all literary critics who aren't established book authors themselves. Might as well start tossing art critics, too.
smile.png
 

Big Flex

Fitness Fascist
4,314
3,166
So I decided to print out the first ebook and get caught up on the new lore as my toilet reading and noticed some references to the Arch Mage casting spells like "compulsion" to extract intelligence from a Drake and it got me thinking about the implications of rich NPC interaction coupled with a possible Enchanter line of spells (Think the Charm spells from Oblivion), seems to me there could be to be a lot of possibilities if SB lives up to its claims. Bards and Enchanters were always on the cutting edge of exploring/exploiting and pushing boundaries in EQ1, perhaps in EQN the Enchanter will be able to do some really, really crazy shit
 

Lleauaric

Sparkletot Monger
4,058
1,822
Well.. So far we know from the stories the spells are compulsion, decay, lightining, and raise dead. I miss any?