Monsters and Memories (Project_N) - Old School Indie MMO

Muligan

Muligan

Trakanon Raider
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953
That's where I worry about this being a subscription based game. I think they need another model or make the sub fairly inexpensive to were people don't care to keep it active. Given their small team and how people consume MMO's one of two things must happen. One, people have to understand and be willing to accept what the game is and choose to support the game if they think this game is needed in the MMO space. Or two, they take the sub off so people can play at the pace they want and bring friends as the itch comes and goes with an alternative pay model. I honestly believe EQ2 did a fairly good job with their shop. It never really impacted the game but it furthered the opportunity to bring some uniqueness to your character, houses, etc. and I think people will do that especially given their character models and such.

Valheim showed us the pace small teams work. Now, its not a MMO so they can get away with it some but its still a very frustrating pace for those who really enjoy the game. Nevertheless, the reality is they can only work so fast. I'm not saying it isn't possible but I do believe its not sustainable.

Maybe they'll surprise me but I really wish the best for them. I enjoy the game but right now I'm pretty well just going through this loop of leveling players through the first few levels and zones.

EQ had what... two raid dragons and a Plane (PoF)... maybe PoH was open at the beginning, I don't remember so I do think quantity isn't completely necessary but if they can create some meaningful, enjoyable experiences, it won't be too bad but when Kunark came out, we had quite a bit more to consume. Epic Quests were actually a lot of fun for me. I enjoyed Seb, Karnors, and the BP's and leggings that were exclusive to those raid encounters to complete your set. You also had quite a bit with Velious with the faction armor and ToV and ST encounters. I felt EQ drifted too far away from the world they created and could have put some of their expansions into their old worlds to give those places additional value instead of turning into ghost zones but I say all of that to say, their approach is going to need to be very intentional and well-planned to keep people interested... its possible... but considering their bandwidth and infrastructure in terms of a team, it could be challenging.
 
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Drapdis

Peasant
34
38
Muligan said:
That's where I worry about this being a subscription based game. I think they need another model or make the sub fairly inexpensive to were people don't care to keep it active. Given their small team and how people consume MMO's one of two things must happen. One, people have to understand and be willing to accept what the game is and choose to support the game if they think this game is needed in the MMO space. Or two, they take the sub off so people can play at the pace they want and bring friends as the itch comes and goes with an alternative pay model. I honestly believe EQ2 did a fairly good job with their shop. It never really impacted the game but it furthered the opportunity to bring some uniqueness to your character, houses, etc. and I think people will do that especially given their character models and such.

Valheim showed us the pace small teams work. Now, its not a MMO so they can get away with it some but its still a very frustrating pace for those who really enjoy the game. Nevertheless, the reality is they can only work so fast. I'm not saying it isn't possible but I do believe its not sustainable.

Maybe they'll surprise me but I really wish the best for them. I enjoy the game but right now I'm pretty well just going through this loop of leveling players through the first few levels and zones.

EQ had what... two raid dragons and a Plane (PoF)... maybe PoH was open at the beginning, I don't remember so I do think quantity isn't completely necessary but if they can create some meaningful, enjoyable experiences, it won't be too bad but when Kunark came out, we had quite a bit more to consume. Epic Quests were actually a lot of fun for me. I enjoyed Seb, Karnors, and the BP's and leggings that were exclusive to those raid encounters to complete your set. You also had quite a bit with Velious with the faction armor and ToV and ST encounters. I felt EQ drifted too far away from the world they created and could have put some of their expansions into their old worlds to give those places additional value instead of turning into ghost zones but I say all of that to say, their approach is going to need to be very intentional and well-planned to keep people interested... its possible... but considering their bandwidth and infrastructure in terms of a team, it could be challenging.
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Instances speed up content consumption multiplicatively. Look at prog servers with instances, expansions are completed within a few days. WoW has to timegate content. Without instancing people are bottlenecked by camps and competition. You either lose players once everyone gets to end game or by turning people off at the start. It’s complicated
 
Kaines

Kaines

Potato Supreme
19,410
55,572
Drapdis said:
They literally cannot create the content people are asking for with the team size they have. The only positive from their size and structure is that they need fewer paying people to be a success.
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You don't need 10 years of content ready to go day one to play an MMO for 10 years. But what you DO need is a strong foundational design that will allow people to see that they will be able to enjoy that content when it arrives. And not cockblocked out of things because 100 assholes decided to camp every interesting mob in a zone.

And it doesn't matter how small your dev team is, a couple hundred people isn't enough to keep the lights on in an MMO.
 
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Drapdis

Peasant
34
38
Kaines said:
You don't need 10 years of content ready to go day one to play an MMO for 10 years. But what you DO need is a strong foundational design that will allow people to see that they will be able to enjoy that content when it arrives. And not cockblocked out of things because 100 assholes decided to camp every interesting mob in a zone.

And it doesn't matter how small your dev team is, a couple hundred people isn't enough to keep the lights on in an MMO.
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Examples?
 
Gravel

Gravel

Mr. Poopybutthole
46,194
166,629
Drapdis said:
Instances speed up content consumption multiplicatively. Look at prog servers with instances, expansions are completed within a few days. WoW has to timegate content. Without instancing people are bottlenecked by camps and competition. You either lose players once everyone gets to end game or by turning people off at the start. It’s complicated
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They only speed up content by allowing all players to actually play the game.

What you're arguing for is essentially restricting access to content for 90% of your players for "longevity."
 
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Drapdis

Peasant
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38
Gravel said:
They only speed up content by allowing all players to actually play the game.

What you're arguing for is essentially restricting access to content for 90% of your players for "longevity."
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I’m saying that’s how eq worked and sort of what this game has to do, like it or not.
 
Kaines

Kaines

Potato Supreme
19,410
55,572
Drapdis said:
Examples of successes. You said they need a strong foundational design and not a lot of content out of the gate. I’m curious what you consider an example of a game doing that.
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World of Warcraft launched without a single raid encounter. How much more of a success do you need?
 
mkopec

mkopec

<Gold Donor>
28,084
44,204
Kirun said:
You're not wrong that most moment-to-moment play in early EQ was group content. That's historically accurate. But the leap from "most people grouped" to "raids didn't matter to the broader population" is where this gets shaky.

Raid content absolutely shaped the game even for people who never stepped foot in Plane of Fear. It shaped the economy. It shaped guild hierarchies. It shaped server politics. It shaped aspiration. People inspected Epics in EC tunnel like they were Ferraris. The fact that only a minority participated directly doesn't mean it wasn't central to the ecosystem.

But let's be honest about why raid participation was limited in 1999. It wasn't some elegant philosophical design choice about "purity" of group gameplay. It was because of technical limitations, instancing not being standard (this is the biggest one - most servers had 2+ "raid" guilds capable of killing most/all content but instead had to fight over it and the lesser guilds were left with scraps or nothing at all, which flat locked players out of the raiding system through no fault of their own), server capacity realities and the genre being brand new.

Most players didn't interact heavily with raids because the genre itself was novel. Just existing in a persistent 3D world with other humans was revolutionary. People weren't min-maxing content cadence or calculating retention loops. They were just blown away that Upper Guk existed. That novelty carried a lot of weight that design didn't have to.

Fast forward to now and that novelty is gone. The audience understands progression systems. They've seen instancing, lockouts, scalable raids, cross-server tech, expectations are different, attention spans are different and competition for players' time is brutal.

So when people say "don't oversell raids," sure - that's fair. EQ wasn't WoW with 40-man instanced content on farm. But pretending raids were some irrelevant side activity that didn't influence the broader experience isn't accurate either. Even if 80% of players never killed Nagafen, they sure as fuck knew who did. They saw the loot. They saw the drama. They saw the forum posts and the forums that spawned from it. That aspirational layer mattered.

If you remove meaningful raid infrastructure in a modern MMO and rely almost entirely on small-group loops, you'd better have a long-term progression plan that doesn't hinge on 1999's novelty factor. Because back then, just logging in was the content. Now? Logging in is step one.
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All im saying is if they are making an EQ spiritual successor, yeah raids were not a thing for most people playing EQ. If they do add raids they better instance them, same for the dungeons (shards) or else people are gonna be pissed. Who wants a game that is 100% accessible only for those that no life the shit out of it, or be put on "lists" for accessing dungeons which is the prime content in the game and waiting for your turn?
 
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