[kohl]

Originally Posted by rangoth

I think VG brought a few things to the table that should be copied/built-up in future MMO's...

1.) Being able to cast while moving, awesome. It slows your move speed down a bit but doesnt ditch the whole spell.

Not sure how this is new. You can cast spells while moving in other games; ie instant cast spells in WoW, etc.

Originally Posted by rangoth

2.) Being able to loot and do other simple activities while casting.

Ok.

Originally Posted by rangoth

3.) Classes. I think they definitly took a step forward in class design. Healers are fun and all classes seem to stack well(some minor issues). The classes in VG are, and I guess this is opinion, fun to play and unique without being dependant on a single class. I would give them a A in this aspect of the game.

If they can get rid of the ol' "holy trinity" and do away with the min/max aspect of raiding (needed certain builds or certain healers) then kudos to them.

Originally Posted by rangoth

4.) Diplomacy. I don't know much about the VG specific diplomacy as I only did the "newbie" quests for it, but the idea of using something other than a giant sword to defeat a mob is creative, fun and should be built upon in future MMORPG's.

I agree. It's a pity they couldn't pull it off and stuck in a card game instead.

Originally Posted by rangoth

5.) Attempt at a real seamless world. Ignore the problems particular to VG for a moment relating to chunking etc and this is an awesome idea. Unlike every other game(I have played) before it this is really a world. Moving weather patterns(are those actually in?), terrain that doesnt just change from jungle to snow in 10 meters, flying creatures that swoop down at you, and more. Did VG master this large world, I don't believe so. But I think games in the future should expand/perfect this idea/model.

I suppose gamers have a short memory span, because UO actually did this, what 10 years ago? I'm pretty sure they have had weather effects (rain/snow). You can ride and sail across the entire world and there was no instancing.

Originally Posted by rangoth

6.)AES, sadly not in VG or in but only in small samples. This sounds like an amazing idea to instancing while keeping a balance. Again, perhaps the VG system is not perfect, but the idea behind AES are very very interesting and should also be expanded upon for any game choosing to not use instancing.

In all fairness, might as well leave it off the list.

Originally Posted by rangoth

7.) Harvesting, I won't touch on this much as I have never it once done in VG. But the way I understand things harvesting as a team is BETTER than harvesting alone...no more competing for the resources(is this true?). I am also under the impression it can(will?) affect the terrain. Cutting down a tree means that the tree really falls, mining an area may cause a cave in preventing access to a cave. I'm not sure if this was all just bullshit media or if it is in game, or planned to be, whatever. The idea is again very cool.

I think there is a lot of room for a game to explore new ways of resource gathering, but it has to be enjoyable.

Originally Posted by rangoth

8.) Ocean shit. Building your own ship and having battles sounds cool. Sadly again don't think this is in VG at the moment, but I've heard it talked about. And yes, I realize it's in EQ now.

UO also had ocean shit, although I don't think they went as far as letting you sink other peoples ships or anything like that. You could certainly buy your own boats.

Originally Posted by rangoth

The only point I am trying to make here is that VG can be a fun game to some, and it's not an absolute horror like made out to be. I also wasn't on the dev team for VG so whether it was false promises, mismanaged resources, being lazy or arrogrant, whatever. I don't know. I do believe however that VG did present an interesting take on the MMORPG worlds that we are familiar with.

I also admit they did reinsert tedium where other games have previously removed it. Such as travel, lfg system a few others. Combined with all the bugs its perfectly understandable to see how it would drive people away. But to say VG brought nothing to the table, in my opinion, is a naive and biased point of view. I hope they finally get in anything they said would be in game that's not and work out all the damn issues they are having, and even then it may be too little too late and never quite recover ala EQ2, though that is doing much better I hear it will never be as good as if it started on the proper foot.

I think this is a major beef people have with VG. Players who followed along with the development of the game heard Brad pine on and on about flying mounts, and ships and housing - but the actual implementation isn't up to snuff.

Not to go off on a tangent, but housing is something I've been following in game after game since UO. I think the reason it worked so well in UO was that people had a lot of ...stuff! For example, the PvP orientation of the game meant folks had 2-3 spare suits of armor in the bank and even more so stashed in their houses, and all this STUFF (furniture, armor, weapons, containers) took up space in the game world; it wasn't just intangible stuff represented with icons living in inventory slots.
For that reason, housing served a very real and crucial purpose of giving you a place to put all that shit. Since UO, items not taking up real estate that way means that housing is really there as kind of a roleplaying prop. I would love to see a game that had housing that served a real purpose like that again.