Monsters and Memories (Project_N) - Old School Indie MMO

The most painful part, after about 30+.. finding groups takes way too long, not really a massive incentive to push 60.. I don't have any skin on how long it takes to get 60 but I can comfortably say there aren't a ton of groups running the higher you get.. i'm sure if you get the tank/heals covered, you'll be sailing.

I can't use my hours as a metric by any means but funny enough to share. A ton of AFK hours, playing other games while waiting for potentional group invites to only deny them because i'm playing something else.

fanaskin said:

yeah i'm not reading this garbage lol, condense this. if you can't express your thought in a couple of sentances you're rambling.

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End of discussion.

It isn't just Gen Z who has ADHD these days. Quit rotting your brain with social media and you might be able to pay attention to things longer than 30 secs.

gauze said:

I doubt I answered anything Kirun.

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I actually agree with a lot of what you're saying here, which is probably why I think we're closer in position than it might seem. And secondly, I always appreciate a good faith reply so I will respond in kind..

I completely understand the appeal of logistics, travel, preparation, supply lines, and having a persistent presence in the world. The wagon example, player outposts, stables, hauling resources back to town, and even your Valheim comparison all resonate with me. Those things can absolutely create immersion and make a world feel larger and more meaningful.

Where I think we differ is that I don't view a personal recall mechanic as being in direct opposition to those systems. To me, there are really two separate conversations happening.

The first is world traversal. How people move around the world, transport goods/inventory, establish trade routes/auctioning, prepare expeditions/"adventures", and interact with geography. I agree that those systems become less interesting if players can instantly bypass them at all times. The second is something much more fundamental - a player's ability to safely disengage from the game when real life demands it. That's where my concern comes from.

When I talk about gate or whatever form it takes, I'm not primarily thinking about moving goods, bypassing travel, or trivializing exploration. I'm thinking about the human sitting behind the keyboard. The examples you gave about finding a quiet corner and logging out are perfectly valid when life is predictable. But that's also kind of the point. Emergencies aren't predictable. Kids get hurt. Work calls unexpectedly. Family situations happen. Internet dies. Life happens. And when those things occur, I don't think the game gains anything meaningful by punishing the player for circumstances completely outside their control.

That's why I keep separating "world friction" from "life friction." I like world friction. I like dangerous zones. I like "meaningful travel" (as much as it's possible in an MMO). I like preparation. I don't mind economies built around geography. I enjoy having reasons to care about where I am in the "world". What I don't particularly enjoy is mechanics that effectively say, "You should have planned your real life emergency better."

To your point about the druid evacuation story? I completely agree. I have a very similar story with a friend of mine who was playing a Wizard. That's an awesome moment. I wouldn't want to remove experiences like that. Group utility, class identity, emergency saves, and unique abilities are all valuable. But I don't think those experiences require players to lack a basic failsafe for real-world interruptions. The druid evac was cool because it solved an in-game problem. The group was in danger. Decisions mattered. Players worked together to survive. That's very different from somebody suddenly needing to leave because their kid fell off a bike. One creates gameplay. The other creates frustration that many players will quit over.

And I think that's where my philosophy differs from a lot of "old-school" MMO design. I generally want consequences to emerge from choices players make inside the game world, not from circumstances occurring outside of it. So while I absolutely understand the appeal of preserving travel, logistics, and preparation, I still think there's room for a universal "I need to leave now" solution that protects the player without dismantling all the systems you described (give it a long cooldown for all I care - that way casters still preserve an "advantage" by being able to cast it whenever they want and martial classes are subject to a cooldown).

Those two goals don't feel mutually exclusive to me.

Kirun said:

The second is something much more fundamental - a player's ability to safely disengage from the game when real life demands it. That's where my concern comes from.

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More like concern trolling. Just don’t play online videogames if you’re so worried the demands of your real life will inconvenience your virtual one. At least have the honesty to lobby for changes on the basis of internal consistency instead of external contingencies like the house catching fire or little Timmy falling down a well lol.

Btw, this game’s potential is already limited by definition of its concept (to say nothing of its “quality”), so its margin of success or failure isn’t gonna be significantly impacted by how many modern player retention mechanics it adopts.

uniqueuser said:

Just don’t play online videogames if you’re so worried the demands of your real life will inconvenience your virtual one.

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Sweet baby Jesus hahahahahahahaha

gauze said:

A ton of AFK hours, playing other games while waiting for potentional group invites to only deny them because i'm playing something else.

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I DEFINITELY want to pay a monthly sub to NOT play a game....

Serious talk, is six months giving this game too much credit??

With the play time discussion I was curious how long it took for me to get to 27 on my Cleric. This includes double digit hours just sitting around chatting/doing not much of anything as well.

GuardianX said:

Playing casually, forgetting to log off because this game doesn't log you off if afk for a time period...

Made it to 49
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on my bard, level 52 that I stagnated when they finally pushed charm changes.

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Realistically you can cut these played down by logging out but I would say about 1/4 to 1/3 of that time is spent doing nothing at all and possibly up to 1/2 the time if you count the time running from camp to camp.

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“Playing casually”

then posts a screenshot that shows you have been logged in literally an average 2.7 hours (edit: second screenshot is 3.7!) per day every single day for over 3 months… oh but you can really shave 1/3 or 1/4 off lmao

Guys the game is about slowing you dowwwwwwwn so you have social interactions just chilling in town buying and selling gear and LFG .... but also don't count that towards how long it takes you to level and if you don't count travel time either or your time tradeskilling it's really just half that total.... and also leveling was super fast on my bard when charm was super broken and then got nerfed into Narnia and ya 6 hours a day for 90 days it pretty casual.

Holy shit.

Who gives a fuck how long anything takes if you're enjoying the game? That's the bottom line for me. I will play until I don't enjoy it. For a new MMO that generally tends to be on average 3-4 months. No box price and only a sub? I will get my moneys worth. But hey I'm just a retarded crayon eater and the constant bitching makes zero sense to me.

Kirun said:

Where I think we differ is that I don't view a personal recall mechanic as being in direct opposition to those systems. To me, there are really two separate conversations happening.

The second is something much more fundamental - a player's ability to safely disengage from the game when real life demands it. That's where my concern comes from.

I'm thinking about the human sitting behind the keyboard. The examples you gave about finding a quiet corner and logging out are perfectly valid when life is predictable. But that's also kind of the point. Emergencies aren't predictable. Kids get hurt. Work calls unexpectedly. Family situations happen. Internet dies. Life happens. And when those things occur, I don't think the game gains anything meaningful by punishing the player for circumstances completely outside their control.

That's why I keep separating "world friction" from "life friction." I like world friction. I like dangerous zones. I like "meaningful travel" (as much as it's possible in an MMO). I like preparation. I don't mind economies built around geography. I enjoy having reasons to care about where I am in the "world". What I don't particularly enjoy is mechanics that effectively say, "You should have planned your real life emergency better."

To your point about the druid evacuation story? I completely agree. I have a very similar story with a friend of mine who was playing a Wizard. That's an awesome moment. I wouldn't want to remove experiences like that. Group utility, class identity, emergency saves, and unique abilities are all valuable. But I don't think those experiences require players to lack a basic failsafe for real-world interruptions. The druid evac was cool because it solved an in-game problem. The group was in danger. Decisions mattered. Players worked together to survive. That's very different from somebody suddenly needing to leave because their kid fell off a bike. One creates gameplay. The other creates frustration that many players will quit over.

And I think that's where my philosophy differs from a lot of "old-school" MMO design. I generally want consequences to emerge from choices players make inside the game world, not from circumstances occurring outside of it. So while I absolutely understand the appeal of preserving travel, logistics, and preparation, I still think there's room for a universal "I need to leave now" solution that protects the player without dismantling all the systems you described (give it a long cooldown for all I care - that way casters still preserve an "advantage" by being able to cast it whenever they want and martial classes are subject to a cooldown).

Those two goals don't feel mutually exclusive to me.

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Poorly trimmed to highlight a more focused point... While I can agree that two separate conversations are happening, they collide. It's a sorta emergent gameplay scenario, thus why saying it trivializes instead of break.. but I think there are just other solutions that could achieve same goal. In the most basic form, of the idea to give everyone an out for an immediate emergency evolves into everyone just having an out whenever they want it.. while basic concept would be to help those who have life emergencies, but it would cascade into so much more.

In the of the 5 min scenario, most of what I have left was abrupt. Not a sorta kid just broke his arm abrupt but more fuck this shit i'm out.. no kind forethought in I need to leave soon; the game isn't that important enough to me that it will hold my time if I want to do something else or don't have patience. I've left parties because I "LD'd" though all i've done is altf4. Albiet, it's because of the sorta safe corner concept. Most of the overworld parties i'm in, usually take place 10-20m away from mob camps where there are no roaming npcs, in the occasion there is one.. it doesn't roam the full 15m in every direction, can easily be assessed while in said party.. It's the difference between being safe or straight to town.. but if we consider something like Wormsbane or any sort of deep tunnel, where I see your argument standing the most.. Preferably I want that to be an investment of your time; your moment to lock in.. the depth in which you travel is equated to how smelly you are irl.. a hey group lets log out here and meet tomorrow to go further. I dont think this should make up majority of the game, but definitely a hunny hold on moment or I cant come to your barmitsva because i'm in the 9th level of hell. But as a person, i'm also a tarkov enjoyer; more than 10k hours.. and while you can b-line the extract.. you're at more risk to do that than just afk'ing in a bush in some maps. I'd much rather see the SWG camping system(literal pitching a tent) added to the game and elaborated on.. than an immediate gate; but I can admit that's a fever dream.

But that goes into a whole other argument on the concept about dungeons and so forth.. If you're aiming to gain levels in WB, unfortunately it's terrible xp that is outdone by anywhere in the overworld.. Now, XP with Item drop; potentially good but easily phased out. Ultimately, it sounds like Shawn has pointed it to it being a sorta test dungeon on seeing what works and doesn't.. so I imagine there is a whole evolution coming, maybe not. We still haven't seen the first foundational changes haha.

So weirdly, I agree with Shawn with the sorta "chase items" and/or religion selections; and while its not in yet, I get the problems persist. No idea what that will look like, but I can say the measuring stick is pretty valuable as a caster(or inq).. sure I can put Sense Magic on my bar; or I can just click a stick. I didn't play EQ but I heard a fable of a warp stick? a gate stick? club? idk.. but you'd beat each other to proc a low %chance gate proc and the loser has to beat feet.. that shit sounds amazing to me and while I get it still doesn't solve the issue of kid just caught the kitch on fire; I still think the crafter option or even religious option is a far better game delievery than giving it to everyone; so compromsial, should be able to cast gate on individual players haha.

Personally, I think it comes down to an issue with crafting. Currently having done Alchemy a little bit, but not enough to get SoW pots. It's extremely hard to move stat potions, nobody wants invis pots, and they recently added a couple new ones; which I still dont think move. Buying 30m - 1hr buff is just beyond people.. Maybe 1 potion 5 use, instead of 1 potion 1 slot; mats can reflect it, idc.. I don't know how you really solve that issue, but I personally think it could be the thing that meets the emergent goals right in the middle. Add lesser gates(nearest shady dealer instead of soulbind), escape rope // lesser evacs, lesser sows.. ect, supply the demand in ways that aren't better, but sufficient.. elevating the sorta supply and demand economy.. make it where leaving town without a couple potions and tools is critical(pain in the ass r/n but when a whole vendoring system gets added it'll make way more sense). In FFXI, food buffs were bare minimum effort req.. Rogues required poisons.. Fuck, I even want casters to require certain reagents(temp or perm).

While it adds a little bit more.. I just want the game to be more than get group, smack mob, hearth; rinse repeat. A problem mentioned a few posts/pages back that resonates with me most, is the lack of challenge is the biggest problem in the game.. I'm also someone who believes that not everyone should have access to every piece of content just because.. but that there should also be content for every kind of person. If you're a single dad working 60hr weeks, totally should have a leveling path of hunting animals and killing sheep to then supply cooks, tailors, and leatherworkers on easy content; while not fast.. profit and progress. If you're a poopsock, what do you mean it took you 6hrs to get to this camp for 12hr farm, and then another 6hrs to get back; sure i'll pay a couple gold for that. You wanna sit in an inn and sell your bussy for money and give a disease debuff? sure go do that.

also not that it matters, but your buffs duration doesn't tax when you log out.

There’s an unfortunate mixture currently of inconvenience/annoyance coupled with a lack of danger. These things are subjective but I’m hearing versions of this from a lot of folks. They are in between mechanics changes and expect the game to get harder in the near future. As far as gate specifically, personally feels weird to give to all classes - but there are plans to make this have less friction, it shouldn’t be an epic adventure every night to get a warrior out of grimtide. Gate proc items plus cheaper pots and maybe gate portals located in different areas are all thoughts being considered