The "art" in WOW was fucking awful. Its pretty immersion breaking to be playing cartoon characters. I fucking HATE the art in WOW.
Pan'Theon: Rise' of th'e Fal'Len - #1 Thread in MMO
- Thread starter gogojira_sl
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Bruman
Golden Squire
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- 0
You may not be a fan of it, but it was far from awful. I grew very, very tired of it myself, but awful? Not by a longshot.
It was extremely well done, extremely consistent, and they used it amazingly to bring their game world to life.
I hate that it spawned so much....cargo cult MMO design out there though, even to the point of impacting other Blizzard games.
Convo
Ahn'Qiraj Raider
- 8,800
- 675
Yea, he was pretty clear.. I don't know how much clarification we will get at KS but hopefully some.
Tmac
Adventurer
- 10,545
- 18,627
Simply incentivizing grouping with bonus xp and creating a dangerous world would go a long way. Wildstar actually gives a grouping bonus if I'm not mistaken. Read that from the "dev play" weekend.
Again, I think it's less about punishing a player and more about incentivizing grouping. I already mentioned making the world dangerous, so maybe if you're grouping there are ways to minimize the penalty. Maybe create items like WoW's [Jumper Cables] and such.
The focus should always be inrewarding players who group, rather than simply creating penalties. I don't disagree with you, I'm just suggesting a different perspective, so to speak.
Tmac
Adventurer
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- 18,627
I don't know. There have been a lot of MMO's developed in the last decade, considering the size of the market. So, I don't think the problem is money.
I think the problem is the relationship of vision and focus. The focus, like I mentioned in a previous post, seems to be on mechanics over stability. Vanguard could be the poster child for this. That's why we got a game with great vision that was unplayable. The vision suffered because of a lack of focus. Obviously, there were some extraordinary influences that helped this, but my point remains.
I think when a visionary, similar to Brad, enters the space and is able to build a team of code All-Stars, we'll see more of WoW's type success.
Miele
Lord Nagafen Raider
- 916
- 48
We added those features in a D&D campaign, there were 2 books devoted to just those aspects: survival guide and dungeoneering guide if I recall correctly. Final response was: more hassle than they were worth, with a few ideas worth keeping.
We liked temperature and food requirements, we didn't like fatigue at all, just to mention two things I remember clearly (been a while), but in a MMO this would mean no sexy armor for ladies in the icy regions and professional wankers don't like that and food is seen as a buff more than anything else or EQ style as something in your inventory that takes up valuable space and you have to refill every so often. In EQ2 they even made special food slots, where you had your choice of small stats boost.
Not sure it's useful stuff.
Damn you people are so demanding. All I need to be happy are 3 things; Trolls, Functioning Doors, and Fishing.
Seriously though, I think we need a lean, mean, fighting machine of an MMO. Get rid of all the fat. I want this MMO to be an F40 Ferrari, and not a Maibach.
Seriously though, I think we need a lean, mean, fighting machine of an MMO. Get rid of all the fat. I want this MMO to be an F40 Ferrari, and not a Maibach.
Tmac
Adventurer
- 10,545
- 18,627
The inability to take something for what it is speaks pretty loudly.
For what it was, WoW's art style was incredibly well done. It was accessible, it was consistent and it fit the IP perfectly.
If you knew what to expect with any part of WoW, it was the art. To say anything otherwise is to totally remove yourself from what made WoW successful.
It goes without saying that their cartoony style alone didn't print mo' money. However, their brand consistency and quality was definitely a new level of precedence for the genre.
Completely agree on its a long shot to fund even a low budget mmo without corporate funding - but would at least like to see the attempt from McQuaid.
On a game mechanics note , a broad one at that , say be does pull it off ( or some other person/group) , I'd like to see one that doesn't completely revamp/destroy the original launch game portion with expansions.
I don't have a problem with expansions for content - I mean basically getting rid of the original game.
My favorite mmo's are long the lines of
EQ through Velious.
DAOC pre Atlantis
Vanilla WoW to original AV
SWG pre CU.
Expansions/revamps past these basically got rid of these games -
Find a way to expand the game over time without destroying tbe original game in the process.
On a game mechanics note , a broad one at that , say be does pull it off ( or some other person/group) , I'd like to see one that doesn't completely revamp/destroy the original launch game portion with expansions.
I don't have a problem with expansions for content - I mean basically getting rid of the original game.
My favorite mmo's are long the lines of
EQ through Velious.
DAOC pre Atlantis
Vanilla WoW to original AV
SWG pre CU.
Expansions/revamps past these basically got rid of these games -
Find a way to expand the game over time without destroying tbe original game in the process.
Mr Creed
Too old for this shit
- 2,400
- 292
Having a vision and implementing good mechanics to match that and be a fun game at the same time is a hurdle you can take when you have secured financing. My concerns come into play much earlier, when the visionary designer? tries to get the money to even start the project.
My fear is that said designer will not get enough money that doesnt have strings attached. Kickstarter if you arent Chris Roberts only goes so far. So he takes money with strings attached from investors, publisher, the mafia, and makes the game we want, and its a mild success. I guarantee you 6 months or 12 months after the mildly successful release whoever gave that money is tugging on those strings and pushing the designer into compromises, and 2 years of compromises later a niche product has turned into an stitched-together mess of attempts to suck more money out of it.
That concern is entirely independent of the quality of the designers and programmers on the team.
Tauro
Bronze Knight of the Realm
- 371
- 26
I wonder when we will finally see the kickstarter... i mean if he wants to use the "traditional" 30 days he should start any day now to avoid ending in the middle of the christmas holidays. He could also do 60 days, dont know if those are more successful though...
As only a dabbler in EVE occasionally over the years , I don't know much about their actual financing/business side.
How have they managed to essentially remain a somewhat hardcore PVP sandbox with a sub without giving in to demands of "make is safer and easier so more casuals will play it" ?
(I know it's been tweaked over the years , but nothing as dramatic as other games )
How have they managed to essentially remain a somewhat hardcore PVP sandbox with a sub without giving in to demands of "make is safer and easier so more casuals will play it" ?
(I know it's been tweaked over the years , but nothing as dramatic as other games )
shabushabu
Molten Core Raider
- 1,417
- 189
Art is subjective but what WoW did was synchronize the experience... The music, animations, art design, world design, NPC design from asthetic perspective were all synchronized... and the result is simple ... Immersion. NO game has replicated that so well IMO.
Convo
Ahn'Qiraj Raider
- 8,800
- 675
Haters gonna hate.
I agree about WoW.. They just did a lot of things right that brought the game together perfectly. The animations and art just seemed to fit so right with the flow of the game
Mr Creed
Too old for this shit
- 2,400
- 292
I think they started their company before the gaming landscape was changed by browsergames/WoW/tablets+smartphones/F2P and had a loyal base of whoknowshowmany subs throughout their run so far. They released the game in 2003, that's a decade ago and an entirely different premise for starting up such a project.
It helps that EVE has no competition for a "flying space ships" game, a high fantasy MMO is much worse off in that regard. I mean, what do you compare EVE to? An EQ remake will be compared to a dozen games with different strength and weaknesses that are more or less still running, including original EQ and P99 and the like, who probably hold a good portion of the interested audience.
popsicledeath
Potato del Grande
- 7,547
- 11,831
Hrm, yes, this really is how it works in the military. You have a 4 person company and when one person dies you can't just go on because that person was so irreplaceable that the entire army crumbles! Modern MMO's need to work more like made up analogies or they'll just be WoW clones!
Here's a clue, you dumb fucking hippie, people in the military bond despite the group size because the group CONTENT they're playing against is real and challenging and matters, not because of the group size. Group size is fairly irrelevant to tuning the difficulty of group content, and really makes more of a difference when tuning solo content. If you have group content based around 6 man groups, a solo player is 1/6th of a group and solo content is harder. Which is why group size in Vanguard was higher than what had become the new norm with WoW. If your group size is 4, less people are going to be grouping because now two people are half a group's effectiveness, instead of 1/3rd, and are relatively more powerful. I was around for the group-size discussion and it's another decision that was far more thought out and deliberate than your ignorant perspective on steamrolling the easiest Vanguard content and thinking you have a clue.
If my rational explanation doesn't explain it for you, consider the following mockery of your ideas:
OMG, I was just thinking really hard about something: what if my personal experiences in a game aren't necessarily true for everyone and aren't even how things were in that game when it was designed initially. So, like, what if the game BECAME a spam-fest zerg-roll, so that's all I can ever say about it, and I'm not experienced or smart enough to see the game initial design wasn't like that at all, and that initial design is what people are referring to when talking about the.... wait, hear me out, I think I'm onto something.... when talking about the design of an upcoming project, what if people are referring to the initial design of a prior project the person making the new project was involved in, and those people are referring to that initial design because it was the portion of the old project the new projects main designer was a part of during design....? Nah, no fucking way. Hai gais, I was thinking, have you ever thought that WoW is like McDonald's!?
I was just thinking. A game like WoW has, what, 5 man groups? And WoW is like the most obviously WoW clone out there! So, any new game with 5 man groups will obviously be bad... so a new game should have 4 man groups, right?! That would make the content designed for 5 man groups harder, because 4 is one less, and all content is designed for 5 man groups and the only way to make content harder is not to make content harder, but to reduce the number of players in a group! I was just thinking.
GUILD WARS 2?!??! SCREW YOU, YOU CASUAL WoW-CLONE LOVING EQ HATER!!! OBVIOUSLY BRAD'S NEW GAME JUST ISN'T FOR YOU!!!
You mean, LIKE Vanguard where the command is literally /torch, you fucking moron?
Stop trying to replicate real life because you don't have one. I want to play a game. Challenging and frustrating and punishing, sure, but still a game. That means I want to PLAYING it and not huddled in a cave with a bunch of other players waiting out a fucking severe weather warning. I'd love a game that pushing group content and the interaction that brings, but I really don't think most people want a game that forces you into a cave with idiots and assholes like you just because sitting in a cave waiting out a storm in a fucking video game is the only way you can imagine anyone would ever want to talk to you or be your friend.
I would love them, but understand that some people wouldn't enjoy them. I think you can get away with hunger/thirst/temperature (one thing i loved most about Vanguard was the different armor sets for diplo, crafting and combat) but im sure some people will feel having to sleep is a "denial of service". I would love for Brad to create a world not a game. Give the people the right tools and world and they will make the game.
Im also ok with very few and limited features coming at launch with other things promised/left to a later date. But this is depends on his budget. Give me a small game with fewer complete systems than a large one with half broke/finished ones. I don't know how others feel but i would take the game with no crafting and just a well thought out and complete combat system and leave crafting to be an expansion and have it done well.
popsicledeath
Potato del Grande
- 7,547
- 11,831
I'd love for all those survival mechanics to be in! And doors! And doors to outhouses! And if you don't take your character for a shit every day your character gets slowed down and cranky. And then sometimes you have to sit out of fights, which cripples the 4-man group, because your character has the shits. Talk about immersion! Everyone will love the game, and at the same time hate how unreliable your character is and it'll be a huge confusing mess for people who want a game they wouldn't actually enjoy playing!
Oh, and there should be illness, too, so if your character catches a bad virus they won't be able to log in for a few weeks. Sorry, guys, I haven't been logging in because my character was sick. Hey, it's no problem, it's just so immersive we were glad our 4 man group couldn't keep progressing!
There's a very fine line between aesthetic flavor being added to a game, and having it become tedious. Actually, no, it's a really broad line. Anything that makes you log into the game and then have to spend time getting ready to spend time getting ready to play the game means you're not playing the game. If the game becomes as much about preparing to play the game, it will suck. So, log in, prepare to play by talking to friends about grouping or running to a group, then play. Not, log in, prepare to play by checking your food, prepare to play by sleeping off your tired meter, prepare to play by waiting out weather patterns, etc, and THEN prepare to play by organizing and running to a group, and THEN finally getting to actually play. No thanks. The more steps you create between logging in and actually playing, the more it sucks.
I used to hate in EQ having to wait on people because they had to run to town to bank to exchange their money to lighter currency and buy food. It didn't make it feel more like a world, but less like a game I was actually getting to play as I waited for fuckers to finish their chores.
Oh, and there should be illness, too, so if your character catches a bad virus they won't be able to log in for a few weeks. Sorry, guys, I haven't been logging in because my character was sick. Hey, it's no problem, it's just so immersive we were glad our 4 man group couldn't keep progressing!
There's a very fine line between aesthetic flavor being added to a game, and having it become tedious. Actually, no, it's a really broad line. Anything that makes you log into the game and then have to spend time getting ready to spend time getting ready to play the game means you're not playing the game. If the game becomes as much about preparing to play the game, it will suck. So, log in, prepare to play by talking to friends about grouping or running to a group, then play. Not, log in, prepare to play by checking your food, prepare to play by sleeping off your tired meter, prepare to play by waiting out weather patterns, etc, and THEN prepare to play by organizing and running to a group, and THEN finally getting to actually play. No thanks. The more steps you create between logging in and actually playing, the more it sucks.
I used to hate in EQ having to wait on people because they had to run to town to bank to exchange their money to lighter currency and buy food. It didn't make it feel more like a world, but less like a game I was actually getting to play as I waited for fuckers to finish their chores.