Monsters and Memories (Project_N) - Old School Indie MMO

Siliconemelons · 2026-09-07T20:42:24-0400

How long did embers adrift last with their darkness nonsense and that was like, their lore… this is just their head up rectum, and most of the community is sucking up so hard they just feel its all good no problem.

The game would only be better for making everything brighter, the armor more visible, the towns navigable and “darkness” only a rare fun “every so often” thing in dungeons only.

You should be able to see and play the game anytime you log in

The art is nice, let people see it. You still can have fun lighting and effects without the nonsense that is now

Hekotat · 2026-09-07T20:49:57-0400

Daidraco said:
I have some bad news for you, then. Shawns stream had him running around in one of the Deep zones and it was pitch fucking black almost. Like he would just run up on a big floating eye out of fucking nowhere. What I AM expecting, is that the Deep races are going to have Ultravision. Unless there is some bullshit tied to it, people are going to fucking flock to those races just so they can run around the game and be able to see everything and anything.

Hell.. Im sitting here thinking, just about everywhere I want to go in the overworld.. is just a route to get to somewhere that goes into a dungeon thats... well, dark. "The overworld is just blinding! Too Bright! .. But, dont care - everything I want to do is underground.

I'm going to be balls deep in the darkness (No homo).

Kithani · 2026-09-07T22:34:10-0400

Siliconemelons said:
How long did embers adrift last with their darkness nonsense and that was like, their lore… this is just their head up rectum, and most of the community is sucking up so hard they just feel its all good no problem.

The game would only be better for making everything brighter, the armor more visible, the towns navigable and “darkness” only a rare fun “every so often” thing in dungeons only.

You should be able to see and play the game anytime you log in

The art is nice, let people see it. You still can have fun lighting and effects without the nonsense that is now

They can keep the darkness in dungeons and the deep but they need to either brighten up night time or come up with some lore where their world has no moon for it to make sense in the overworld.

It would be interesting to know how internally debated some of this stuff is amongst the team working on it I think Shawn has mentioned Ultravision is still being discussed to the last minute

Noodleface · 2026-09-08T08:33:06-0400

I have to imagine they don't really want people cranking gamma to get around it so it'd be nice if it was dark but not pitch dark

Kithani · 2026-09-08T10:12:13-0400

Noodleface said:
I have to imagine they don't really want people cranking gamma to get around it so it'd be nice if it was dark but not pitch dark

Believe it or not, it used to be a lot darker. What you’ve been playing is post-adjustment because they realized their intended effect only worked with certain monitors

Pasteton · 2026-09-08T10:40:00-0400

The night elf males actually look pretty cool i think, when some of the beards and staches.

they need to just hire a Korean for the female models for basically every race, their sub count would triple instantly

Mrniceguy · 2026-09-08T10:54:37-0400

Daidraco said:
This is with infravision AND a lamp (8 days ago. Wait till it gets about to 1:25:50)

I agree that certain zones and certain areas can be too dark. I think you should remember these zones aren't all complete yet. Even when they're they can still be adjusted. I'd much prefer them to add lightings sources in those certain areas rather than generically turn the brightness of the game up. Wyrmsbane is like this and i'd want the Deep to be similar.

Hekotat · 2026-09-08T10:59:52-0400

Mrniceguy said:
I agree that certain zones and certain areas can be too dark. I think you should remember these zones aren't all complete yet. Even when they're they can still be adjusted. I'd much prefer them to add lightings sources in those certain areas rather than generically turn the brightness of the game up. Wyrmsbane is like this and i'd want the Deep to be similar.

Or use any of the baked in class abilities, torches, lanterns etc.

Solutions already exist, everyone ignores them.

Wizard light, archer flare, torches, belt lanterns, elementalist fire pet, glowing chest pieces, etc.

I hope they add more darkness, more risk = more memories and chaos/comedy.

Mur · 2026-09-08T11:40:47-0400

I'd be happy if they just made my fire beetle eye, or lightstone last for more than 5 minutes. There are definitely areas where they went full retard...

The choice between cranking Gamma up to max while having infravision just so I can find an ore node at night, while the same settings basically fry my retinas in the harsh daylight, vs not seeing anything at night is annoying. It too damn much! EQ did it so much better in every way.

Certain races see in the dark, some don't. Those that don't get a GLS, or equip a light giving item. Easily remedied tradeoff.

Having races that live their life underground needing something special to see in the dark is just another full retard situation.

Noodleface · 2026-09-08T12:03:26-0400

Hekotat said:
Or use any of the baked in class abilities, torches, lanterns etc.

Solutions already exist, everyone ignores them.

Wizard light, archer flare, torches, belt lanterns, elementalist fire pet, glowing chest pieces, etc.

I hope they add more darkness, more risk = more memories and chaos/comedy.

Believe it or not, I get all this.

I think my main thought really is there's a hard line developers make sometimes in the interest of their vision and they forget about what's fun. To me, worrying about seeing or being pitch black in an MMO just isn't fun. There are ways around it now so I'm not gonna die on this hill or anything, I just think it's hard for the sake of being hard.

Flipmode · 2026-09-08T12:48:21-0400

Mur said:
I'd be happy if they just made my fire beetle eye, or lightstone last for more than 5 minutes. There are definitely areas where they went full retard...

The choice between cranking Gamma up to max while having infravision just so I can find an ore node at night, while the same settings basically fry my retinas in the harsh daylight, vs not seeing anything at night is annoying. It too damn much! EQ did it so much better in every way.

Certain races see in the dark, some don't. Those that don't get a GLS, or equip a light giving item. Easily remedied tradeoff.

Having races that live their life underground needing something special to see in the dark is just another full retard situation.

That was my gripe. Money is hard to come by n the early game. Those refills are expensive and the fire eyes last like 5 mins. Fix that and problem solved. Belt lights are also retarded. Now I have less carry capacity because of a design choice? Add the extra slot and call it a day.

Siliconemelons · 2026-09-08T12:52:00-0400

Even EQ got rid of humans blind AF

Infravision does basically nothing... it turns on/off and I only have had it "work" in the cave to wyrmsbane, but if you pay attention to that area there are literally like 2-3 "light" triggers in that cave "for the effect" and yeah cool and all, when it overall as a concept is killing your playability everywhere - the entire "art style" needs to be reviewed and changed

Daidraco · 2026-09-08T13:28:57-0400

Hekotat said:
Or use any of the baked in class abilities, torches, lanterns etc.

Solutions already exist, everyone ignores them.

Wizard light, archer flare, torches, belt lanterns, elementalist fire pet, glowing chest pieces, etc.

I hope they add more darkness, more risk = more memories and chaos/comedy.

I dont hate the darkness. I think the zone in that video hes showcasing is really fucking neat. The spinning spotlight eye and all the shit reminds me of some other games I really enjoyed. The "theme" of that zone is really fucking cool and it would LOOK cool - if you could actually see it more than 5 feet a time.

Ill try to summarize the changes that "I" think needs to happen.
1. Make a Light Source slot on the character sheet with an ammo slot for fuel.
2. Decrease the cost of the lantern to 4 silver, not 4 gold.
3. Create a hand holding quest that takes the player directly to the Lumber, Survivalist, and Medic trainer - so a player knows how to make a torch, bandages, and acquire the ingredients to make the torch, fuel, bandages, etc.
4. Create multiple tiers of Fuel that increases the lanterns reach, efficiency, and/or allows other advantages.
(To expand upon this: First fuel tier stays the same as it is right now. Second fuel tier increases time and light reach. Third tier is a fuel that resets the vision down to the original fuel level, but gives up close "see invis". Fourth tier, more light and efficiency, etc. etc.)

Just those simple changes would overcome the hardship faced by lower level players, give some form of content, AND it puts a desire for other races to acquire a Lantern as well. As it sits right now, the advantage of the innate trait of infravision or ultravision is just "too high" in comparison to anything that a Human could bring to the table.

If all of that, or some of that is "planned" then I completely agree that "its just a matter of time" as

Mrniceguy suggests. But I havent heard of them doing anything like that and they just keep saying "itll change" .. and all I keep seeing is the exact opposite. "Look at this zone. Its so dark! Everything will pop out at the player and create a new level of difficulty based on the environment alone!" ... /yawn.

Siliconemelons · 2026-09-08T14:00:02-0400

People have said there are some lanterns and equipment that last forever.

But 5 feet..10 feet 15 feet of slight glow.. who cares…its useless

I have infraqvision on my pally, it does nothing.

Once patch hits and I get my new spells I’ll take a screen shot in fallen pass vs making that run twice lol. Its Outdoor, uncovered… pitch black.

Siliconemelons · 2026-09-08T14:57:55-0400

oh, patch is THURSday? okay off to stupid FP with me

Kirun · 2026-09-08T15:37:48-0400

Having a "dark" section of a dungeon that is extremely dangerous, highly rewarding, and something you deliberately prepare for? That's fine. Having darkness be an important part of a boss or named encounter? Also fine. Those are mechanics that create meaningful decisions and can make a particular area feel distinct. But having darkness simply exist as a constant "background" annoyance that you have to carry around light sticks for, work around, or constantly compensate for throughout normal gameplay is a completely different thing. And I think it's an important distinction when designing a game like M&M.

There is a massive difference between a mechanic that makes you play differently and a mechanic that simply makes you play more inconveniently. If darkness forces me to decide whether I want to risk entering a dangerous area for better rewards, coordinate with my group, bring specific tools/classes, or make meaningful tactical decisions, great. That's gameplay.

If darkness just means I'm constantly squinting at my monitor, carrying a light source, stopping to deal with it, or otherwise working around an environmental limitation that exists solely because "old MMOs had darkness," then eventually it just becomes another chore. Once the novelty wears off, I'm not thinking "Wow, what an immersive and dangerous world!" I'm thinking, "Jesus fucking Christ, I wish I didn't have to deal with this shit every time I enter a dungeon."

And I think this gets at a larger problem with a lot of modern "old-school MMO" design. There seems to be this tendency for devs of these projects to recreate the friction of older games while forgetting why that friction existed in the first place. And then they design the game around a memory of their 16 year old selves - A lot of us played these games when we were teenagers or in our early 20s. We had enormous amounts of free time. Losing an hour because you got lost in a dungeon, waiting for a group, traveling across the world, recovering a corpse, or dealing with some obscure mechanic wasn't necessarily a major problem. You could just... spend the evening doing it. But I'm not 16 anymore.

A lot of the people who grew up playing EverQuest, FFXI, DAoC, etc. are now in their 30s, 40s, 50s and even 60s. We have jobs, families, responsibilities, and a completely different relationship with our leisure time. More importantly, we've had 25+ years of MMO evolution to learn what works, what doesn't, what creates meaningful gameplay, and what is simply tedious. That doesn't mean we want everything streamlined into a theme-park MMO. Quite the opposite. I still want danger, downtime, exploration, etc. I still want meaningful preparation, class identity, group dependency, and a world that doesn't constantly hold my hand.

But I don't think "make everything inconvenient" is synonymous with old-school MMO design. The best version of this philosophy is friction that creates gameplay. The worst version is friction that merely consumes time. And that's where I think the current implementation of a lot of systems in M&M miss the mark.

Systems like darkness can matter. Make certain areas genuinely terrifying because you can't see what's around the next corner. Make a pitch-black dungeon wing something you need to prepare for. Put rare mobs, valuable resources, or a nasty named encounter in there. Make players debate whether the risk and preparation are worth the reward (they almost never are - but still...). That's awesome.

But if the entire dungeon is just perpetually dark because darkness itself is supposed to be an authentic old-school inconvenience, I don't see the value. Eventually it's just something players learn to tolerate rather than something they actually enjoy. There's a difference between "This game respects my time by making every moment meaningful" and "This game wastes my time because that's what games did 25 years ago because of hardware, graphic, internet, etc. limitations."

Siliconemelons · 2026-09-08T16:35:42-0400

I believe we all are hoping for logic to win, but we really need to go back to Shawn's like 3rd stream after announcing the project- when he was making first AC/Wyrsmbane on stream and how much he was gushing over the lighting system... its like it was his first paid for unity extension and we just HAVE TO USE IT or something

Kharzette · 2026-09-08T16:59:05-0400

Pasteton said:
The night elf males actually look pretty cool i think, when some of the beards and staches.

they need to just hire a Korean for the female models for basically every race, their sub count would triple instantly

If one of you could sneak the modeler this channel: https://www.youtube.com/@2amgoodnight

This channel has been slowly figuring out all the secrets of the east. They don't share this stuff, but lately the marketing departments have been forcing them to release their models, and this person has been pulling them apart and learning all the dark arts.

I dunno how much of that is useful to the super lowspec style of M&M, but I've found so many good secrets there.

Siliconemelons · 2026-09-08T17:10:29-0400

Kharzette said:
If one of you could sneak the modeler this channel: https://www.youtube.com/@2amgoodnight

This channel has been slowly figuring out all the secrets of the east. They don't share this stuff, but lately the marketing departments have been forcing them to release their models, and this person has been pulling them apart and learning all the dark arts.

I dunno how much of that is useful to the super lowspec style of M&M, but I've found so many good secrets there.

Is that the one you or someone posted in the make games career thread?

The magic those korean modelers do on boobs and hips is... next (high) level insane (goodness)

But M&M is like "No lulz, RIP Elftitties!"

Kharzette · 2026-09-08T17:13:30-0400

Siliconemelons said:
Is that the one you or someone posted in the make games career thread?

The magic those korean modelers do on boobs and hips is... next (high) level insane (goodness)

But M&M is like "No lulz, RIP Elftitties!"

Yea that's the same one. They are wizards!

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