38 Studios Copernicus, Mercury and other stuff

[Miele]

Originally Posted by Ngruk

I'll take that bet. We've heard it for the past 2 years and we keep hearing it. For many it's the wishful thinking, imo, that led to WAR and AoC garnering over 3/4 million pre-orders.

We root for someone until they become a favorite Everyone is WANTING WoW to fail, WHILE THEY PLAY IT!

I have ZERO problems sitting here telling you, again imo, that outside of this board the MMO world revolves around WoW and it's 13mm subs. There isn't even a HINT of a second place/runner up right now and the longer that goes I would argue the less likely that will happen given that we now have multiple YEARS invested in our online avatars.

That's going to change at some point, there is a tipping point somewhere down the road where the decline will start and not be able to be stopped, but I sure as hell don't know when that is.

I'll add that I am ok with that too, as I enjoy being able to watch kick ass companies do awesome stuff in the space and continually getting to learn from that.

The problem is that not many games out there are good, the few who are good, have different issues, like being too pvp, too pve, not polished enough, or with bad or semi-bad combat systems and what have you.

Personally I love EQ2, it's seriously a good game, with combat that is not on par with other games, but can still be quite fun. I play(ed) WoW because my friends were there, but now I said "stop" as the game is not really appealing to me anymore and the last few months were just a waste of my time.

Time invested is maybe important if you are a virgin in these games, I couldn't care less, nor I did when I left my 400 days of played each, cleric/bard duo in EQ1 to try new games. I know that argument exists for some, but certainly not for me.

I personally know exclusively old school players and they all left WoW or are leaving it because it's bland and has only raiding as its focal point (and some of it sucks as well). I imagine that 15€ are 15€ wherever they come from, so Blizzard doesn't care enough to cater to such demographic as long as subs keep increasing.

I just hope that one MMO in the next year or two will come out and not suck, also keeping in mind that not everyone wants just rewards, but challenges and risks too (and hard modes raid shouldn't be the only content that matters).

Everything else is fluff, a MMO can be good with 100k subs, make that 300k and money starts rolling in pretty nicely, 10+ millions is an anomaly. Some people should just accept that and go back making their game, a polished fun game.

[Barnum]

Originally Posted by Edko

I haven't read all 64 pages so skip if it's been asked, but is the skill based system e.g. UO dead to MMO makers now? I don't play MMOs anymore but a similar type model with current graphics and whatnot would interest me. I think "ding, 50!" is pretty played out.

In essence, a UO2 (ish)

Would love to see this. I really think a lot of valuable dev time could be put to better use creating a larger more in-depth world, rather then the areas so many people seem to rush thru just to get to the top level anyways. I like the fact in Eve you enter the world in a somewhat safer area, but can immediately move out and take your chances or join friends who are months/years ahead of you skillwise. Your not going to be flying a titan right away, but you can still get into things quick enough.

[Ukerric]

Originally Posted by Ngruk

WoW and it's 13mm subs.

Actually less, since Netease ("wow china") got its autorisation to operate yanked under its feet, less than two months after the relaunch.

Yes, China is offline again.

[TwiNCannoN]

Originally Posted by Barnum

Would love to see this. I really think a lot of valuable dev time could be put to better use creating a larger more in-depth world, rather then the areas so many people seem to rush thru just to get to the top level anyways. I like the fact in Eve you enter the world in a somewhat safer area, but can immediately move out and take your chances or join friends who are months/years ahead of you skillwise. Your not going to be flying a titan right away, but you can still get into things quick enough.

I've had the same thought for a while now. Every time a game comes out that has quest-based progression I recall this line of thinking. Why quests, let alone level-based progression? What a huge waste of development time. Not only do you have to make tons and tons of content just to placate players through the process of getting to the endgame, but if you only have one path for the players to progress through they'll complain about lack of choice/options.

Not to mention the quests are such horrible filler anyway - I know everyone here is the same way with the 10-bear-asses quests where we've become these human scanners, able to instantly look at paragraphs of text to decipher key numbers and locations and go find the bears who have the specific asses necessary for quest completion. Frankly I still prefer EQ camp grinding to that, although I'm fairly sure I'm in the minority on that point haha.

I mean again looking at UO, or even EVE as a more recent example (which we know today is successful as far as profit and stability/growth goes). The content in these games is laughable. When really they should be the ones laughing at the diku games. Everquest on it's 16th expansion... WoW redoing their entire game and stats system due to mudflation and other mechanic changes (flying mounts etc.)... it's a joke when you have systems in place to either bypass this content or create it dynamically. Now I'm not saying some random EVE solar system has the same depth and beauty of any given WoW zone, certainly they do not. However, the development cost difference is inarguable.

I'm not saying this is the Final Solution for all MMO players. Obviously it's a different market. Hell, it might even be a niche market at this point with how engraved into people's minds level/quest-based progression is. But I highly doubt it's not a profit-worthy share of the MMO market waiting to be tapped (specifically, a current-gen fantasy "sandbox" mmo). And for unproven, small developers looking to stake their claim in the market, this really seems like a given as to where they should focus their design - NOT on the massive content heavy timesinks that are diku/wow-likes.

[Greyform]

Originally Posted by TwiNCannoN

I've had the same thought for a while now. Every time a game comes out that has quest-based progression I recall this line of thinking. Why quests, let alone level-based progression? What a huge waste of development time. Not only do you have to make tons and tons of content just to placate players through the process of getting to the endgame, but if you only have one path for the players to progress through they'll complain about lack of choice/options.

Not to mention the quests are such horrible filler anyway - I know everyone here is the same way with the 10-bear-asses quests where we've become these human scanners, able to instantly look at paragraphs of text to decipher key numbers and locations and go find the bears who have the specific asses necessary for quest completion. Frankly I still prefer EQ camp grinding to that, although I'm fairly sure I'm in the minority on that point haha.

I mean again looking at UO, or even EVE as a more recent example (which we know today is successful as far as profit and stability/growth goes). The content in these games is laughable. When really they should be the ones laughing at the diku games. Everquest on it's 16th expansion... WoW redoing their entire game and stats system due to mudflation and other mechanic changes (flying mounts etc.)... it's a joke when you have systems in place to either bypass this content or create it dynamically. Now I'm not saying some random EVE solar system has the same depth and beauty of any given WoW zone, certainly they do not. However, the development cost difference is inarguable.

I'm not saying this is the Final Solution for all MMO players. Obviously it's a different market. Hell, it might even be a niche market at this point with how engraved into people's minds level/quest-based progression is. But I highly doubt it's not a profit-worthy share of the MMO market waiting to be tapped (specifically, a current-gen fantasy "sandbox" mmo). And for unproven, small developers looking to stake their claim in the market, this really seems like a given as to where they should focus their design - NOT on the massive content heavy timesinks that are diku/wow-likes.

I agree, I tried getting this conversation going a couple pages back as well.

Originally Posted by Greyform

Curt, are you following the Aion thread at all? Specifically the debate over bots? Although I am 100% against them. I also 100% understand the reason people will resort to using them.

The level grind. When will this go away? Why make a game where a large percentage of your content becomes obsolete once you are near max level. at level 40 in a 50 level game you can say pretty much 80% of your game is obsolete unless people decides to make an alt. That seems like a pretty large percentage of resources going to waste. By waste I mean once a starting area is finished why go back? Or 20-29 areas and so forth. Why explore other starting areas?

I would really like to see a game about character development that did not have levels attached to them.

There seems to be a lot of ways to eliminate levels. Has your team put much thought into this, and where did you land on the subject?

Last night I had to run back through a starting zone in Aion to complete a quest. There wasn't a soul in the zone. I had to go there a couple of times in fact. No one to be found. All that content and all the time it took to create is just sitting there unused (or hardley used). What a waste.

[maskedmelon]

Eliminating leveling might be one part of ridding a game of expendable content, but the real challenge becomes how does one create content that remains useful while still allowing players to advance their characters. The game must be designed in such a way that players establish goals and/or paths to those goals differently from those of other mmos.

The primary goal of nearly every mmo (all that I can think of) is acquisition of "power", which oddly enough is most often measured in capabilities of force, which are of course based on a character's attributes, which is always tied to a player's time invested. Certain activities must be implemented to allow players to advance their characters, but the question is of course how can a player feel a sense of accomplishment through advancement without trivializing previous steps along the path? The only two that my feeble mind have been able to identify are:

1. mixing and twisting paths of advancement such that players are brought back through the same content farther down the path, but perhaps with a different perspective this time, and/or

2. eliminating linear advancement such that any step in the path of advancement can be completed at anytime, but only in certain areas (i.e. certain abilities, items, etc. could only be obtained in specific locations, but abilities/items of comparable power, but entirely different nature could be obtained at other locations).

I guess the goal in the latter scenario would be working to some sort of "completion" rather than improvement. Content could be added in the same way. New things to do (that are unrelated to other things) in the same areas.

[Zehn - Vhex]

Or just accept that you're going to have a disproportionately top heavy game and focus on making it all enjoyable. The purpose of low level content is to hook new players and make creating alts fun not to keep you interested in the game for 5 years. That's what end game content is for.

[Barnum]

Originally Posted by Zehn - Vhex

Or just accept that you're going to have a disproportionately top heavy game and focus on making it all enjoyable. The purpose of low level content is to hook new players and make creating alts fun not to keep you interested in the game for 5 years. That's what end game content is for.

True, but it does not mean a different path could not work as well.

[Zehn - Vhex]

Originally Posted by Barnum

True, but it does not mean a different path could not work as well.

Well on that much I agree. I have a serious issue with player power being directly proportional to how many boars you've slain.

[MagicNumbers]

Originally Posted by Zehn - Vhex

Well on that much I agree. I have a serious issue with player power being directly proportional to how many boars you've slain.

That just gave me an idea. Would players buy a "leveling" system that was based on what major content/sotryline you've completed?

You could gain new attributes or whatever after clearing dungeon X as opposed to hundreds of collection quests like the later grind in Vanguard.

[Greyform]

Originally Posted by MagicNumbers

That just gave me an idea. Would players buy a "leveling" system that was based on what major content/sotryline you've completed?

You could gain new attributes or whatever after clearing dungeon X as opposed to hundreds of collection quests like the later grind in Vanguard.

EQ2 sort of does this with AA exp earned by killing named mobs or going to new areas with your character. I believe a system like that can be expanded upon.

[maskedmelon]

Originally Posted by MagicNumbers

That just gave me an idea. Would players buy a "leveling" system that was based on what major content/sotryline you've completed?

You could gain new attributes or whatever after clearing dungeon X as opposed to hundreds of collection quests like the later grind in Vanguard.

That would be one way of doing it. Another would be to simply allow players to make such acquisitions by defeating specific foes/encounters, or by reaching a certain location (item drops, environment spawns, learned/observed abilities, etc.). And players would not be restricted to the train tracks of quest driven content.

[Ngruk]

Originally Posted by Zehn - Vhex

Time and technology are your biggest hurdles, not ideas. These threads should be an obvious example of that.

I disagree with half of this. Technology is only a hurdle, imo, if you make it a factor in the quality of your game. It's not for Mercury, it's not for Copernicus. I think you all realize this based on the few screen shots of our art style.

We aren't making many, if ANY technical gambles, and really why would we? The thing we are methodically grinding on, every single day, is massive, in every conceivable way. To add technical risks would be idiotic imo.

Oh sure, I think we are doing some things that are advancing the genre and they do rely on tech, but those are the things you drive the risk out of right up front right? That's what concept->Pre-Production are for right?

You don't conceive and make your game during those phases, you iterate on your game as early in those processes as possible. It's why 'working software' was and has always been the daily directive.

We got our live client/server up and running a long time ago for that very reason. Iterating on the actual content itself is far and away the most powerful design tool we'll ever have available to us.

If we can't have butt loads of fun every day we iterate, are we not idiotic and insane to think you will like it?

[Greyform]

So can we get your opinion on levels and making content disposable once a certain level has been achieved?

Would you find a game that character development was more about where you've been and what you've done something you would or could get behind creating? Or is Copernicus going to be another "Ding level 2" "Ding Level 3" treadmill?

[Palum]

Leveling is fine but developers have drained all the fun out of content to get up to the maximum level. I had a ton of fun leveling in EQ, AC, early WoW to some degree and others. More recent MMOs have been basically 5-20 day playtime payment systems to get to the actual game.

I mean sure, to some degree it's reasonable that it's difficult to create meaningful content in the character advancement area at lower levels except in order to get to the end. Could you really make an epic level 5 quest chain reward meaningful at level 195 without people skipping over it to do more efficient things and coming back later to rape it for an amazing item? Probably not. But then again this is fairly cyclical, the time input has to be > time saved generally speaking. If you spend 3 hours getting a piece of gear with marginal stats that will save you 15 minutes leveling time overall, most people simply won't consider it meaningful or worth the effort unless the content is genuinely fun in the first place (or required I guess).

Hint hint.