Freedom or Profit

September 8, 2010

Trusting your players is a risky move in an MMO.

Accepting risky moves is often counterproductive to turning a profit, which is why the ‘safe’ choice when designing an MMO is to remove that potential risk and limit or eliminate any trust you might require from your players. At the same time, trusting your players and giving them more options or ‘freedom’ is an almost inherent quality to a virtual world. I think you can see where this is going.

Let’s look at a game like Ultima Online, EVE, or Darkfall. Lets pretend you believe those games are amazing in terms of presenting the player with a perfect virtual world; sounds good right? And not only is the design perfect, but whenever a new player logs in they could very well interact with a helpful player right away and be instantly pulled into what makes a virtual world so great, player-driven content.

Or they might be ganked and griefed.

And it’s that second option that terrifies most dev teams, because no matter how well they design their virtual world, no matter how perfect the coding, the art, the sound; by giving your players that freedom you accept the fact that even though many will put it to good use and IMPROVE your game, others will inevitable abuse it or add an element many find offensive.

That’s why in many ways, virtual worlds will indeed always remain a niche product, while the broader MMO concept has the potential to attract millions of ‘casuals’. The casual simply is not interested enough in the game to demand the more ‘advanced’ features that a virtual world brings by providing player freedom. A game without those freedoms is limited to dev-driven content only, but the casual player will never push far enough to get past that, or to reach its limits and demand more.

The ‘ideal’ player for an MMO is one who just logs in whenever content is provided, and if they consume content at a steady, sustainable pace, you never have to worry about losing them to some outside factor like ganking or how limited your ‘virtual world’ really is. The casual player does not view it as a world, does not demand it to function like a world, and overall simply does not ask as much from the game as someone who is more into what an MMORPG is at its core.

In direct contrast, a fan of virtual worlds will demand more and more freedoms in order to create or experience what they believe is the best aspect of the genre; player-driven content. They view the devs role as one to provide more tools rather than defined content, because with the proper tools such players will always create the content that suits them best.

Or they will abuse those tools and destroy the world.

The history of the genre has examples of both, from highlight-reel stuff like the stories from EVE to the “Play to Crush” debacle that was Shadowbane. It’s a very risky move to ultimately trust internet strangers with the health and ultimate survival of your livelihood, yet when done right the rewards are certainly there, and for me, that is far more interesting to watch then the next iteration of Simon Says for 30 minute mute groups.

Chuck-o-the-day: Chuck Norris was the first black president.

7 Comments | Darkfall Online, EVE Online, MMO design, Ultima Online | Permalink
Posted by SynCaine

Two years of WAR = …

September 7, 2010

1) Has any game in MMO history redesigned more core systems then WAR? Amazing to think what could have been added these last two years if Mythic could stop ‘fixing’ things every patch.

2) Adding a third, PLAYABLE faction would actually fix much of what troubles WAR. Good thing Mythic is strongly against actually doing that.

“It takes a lot of effort to bury an IP as great as Warhammer, and we’ll be damned if THQ beats us to it!” – Mythic

10 Comments | MMO design, Patch Notes, Rant, RvR, Warhammer Online | Permalink
Posted by SynCaine

Tropico 3 Review

September 7, 2010

As previously mentioned I picked up Tropico 3 for $6 thanks to the current Direct2Drive sale, and I’m very glad I did. The game is a very lighthearted and comical take on the SimCity genre, and made for a great second game to League of Legends over the long weekend.

I’ll get the ‘required’ review stuff out of the way first: the graphics are very nice, especially maxed out, but the engine does put your hardware to the test. Even my beefy Alienware computer had trouble keeping things at 30FPS+ at 1900×1200 maxed. Not that you need a super high framerate to enjoy the game, given its slower pace, but if you have borderline hardware you might have to scale things down. The sound is also very enjoyable, with a fitting soundtrack and some funny (if not repetitive) radio banter. The expected sounds of the city fit well and bring you into the game rather than distract you from it. So far I have no run into any bugs, errors, or crashes.

With that stuff out of the way, here are some reasons I’m really enjoying Tropico beyond the fact that it’s just a solid, well executed game. For starters, it’s a somewhat ‘casual’ game, in that you don’t have to understand every last working bit to be successful and make your way through a scenario. So long as you understand some basics (and the game does a good job of teaching those), you can get a functional economy going and learn from there. The game is very good at giving you feedback about what you might be doing wrong, or what your island needs, and so far I’ve not seen any one thing that is do-or-die in terms of importance. I think part of the reason I’m enjoying this aspect as much is because I know Civilization V will be almost the complete opposite, and while I love mastering the details of a game, it’s also nice to just be able to sit back and play rather than dominate.

The campaign, which is a series of different island challenges, has so far been interesting. Each island has its own setup or problem, and with a wide variety of events that go off as you play, you can’t just copy/paste the same strategy for every city. Also unlike SimCity itself, you can’t manipulate the terrain much in Tropico, which means you have to fit your city into the island you are given rather than bulldoze everything so it all fits. This was a really smart design decision as it really brings out the strategy of setting up each island, and making sure you place things with some consideration for the future.

The final item I want to bring up is the humor, because Tropico has it in spades and it not only keeps you entertained as you play, but factors into the gameplay as well. Since the game is set between the 1950s and 1980s, the US and USSR are the two super powers vying to control your island, and keeping them both happy is critical. Both are portrayed in stereotypical fashion, with the US being all about money and capitalism while the USSR is all ‘for the people’ and communist. Between the different radio sound bites that play as you go and the different events that you or the game triggers (getting paid to be the site of a nuke test by the US for example), you never get too pulled in to building the perfect city block, something I always felt SimCity breaks down to and ultimately gets boring because of.

I believe the sale only lasts until tomorrow, so if you are even a remote fan of the city building genre, or want a fun casual game to fill up some time, Tropico is a steal right now. At $6, it’s impossible not to recommend it.

Chuck-o-the-day: When Google can’t find something, they Norris it.

1 Comment | Random | Permalink
Posted by SynCaine

Choosing not to have fun

September 3, 2010

The world has officially gone mad, as on a Friday, typically the day for a good blog war, I’m just linking to Tobold to comment on a post (and also because his post above, about blog roll drama, is hilarious). Anyway, the post in question here is about player freedom, or whether a game’s rules should prevent a player from optimizing the fun out of the game.

The discussion started when Tobold co-author Nils (it’s still Friday!) said that the WoW dungeon finder is not a good addition, as it makes it too easy to sit in one city and chain-queue instances all day long (which sounds exactly like WAR in the early days). Tobold is in favor of player choice, so while the dungeon finder is available, he argues that he still has the option to do solo content, see other areas, and generally advance his character (the ‘point’ of an MMO, especially WoW) without being ‘forced’ to chain-queue.

And while I believe Tobold when he says he will exercise the other options available to him to have fun, I also know that most MMO players won’t. They WILL chain-queue whatever is the optimal path, grind themselves into the ground, and then complain that the game is boring and needs to be ‘fixed’ (or they will just silently cancel and walk away). I believe part of a game developers job is to guide the player along to maximize the fun, and the somewhat recent trend of “reward for everything” has made this more and more difficult. Simply designing an interesting encounter is no longer enough, because unless that encounter drops the uber shiny, at most people will see it once and go back to grinding “watch paint dry mob” because he has a chance to drop something to increase your stats by .01%.

Now whether the root cause of this issue is over-incentivizing (WoW) or providing a too-easy-to-follow optimal path (WAR) depends on the game, but the problem still comes down to a design mistake. A well designed game will provide proper incentives to try different activities, or to play for the pure fun of an activity rather than some ulterior motive (gear).

MMOs are an additional design challenge because they need to keep you playing for months at a time due to the business model, so it would simply be impossible to have months and months of content that is all new, all pure fun. A successful MMO will include ‘grind’, that’s a given, its how that grind is balanced and incorporated with everything else that is key. If you are grinding just to reach yet another grind, only to ultimately have the devs hit the reset switch and start you back at square one, that’s going to eventually catch up to you. If the grind is the ‘downtime’ between high point, or if the grind is the ‘buildup’ to something memorable, many players will either look past it or not even notice they are ‘grinding’.

Some players won’t see the benefits and refuse to play along, and that’s a risk you take. Recent years have shown that many players prefer a constant, consistent, slow feed of rewards for chain-queue-style activities, but for me that’s a large change from what the MMO genre is (or was?) all about. Without the lows or downtime, you can’t have the very memorable highs that a good MMO can provide, and to truly get to those high points, you need the players to feel like they determined that path and outcome. It’s just unfortunate that too many elect not to go on that journey, and would rather queue up for the ‘sure thing’, even if it’s watching grass grow.

Chuck-o-the-day: Every time Chuck Norris hears the name “Virgin Mary”, he chuckles to himself.

12 Comments | MMO design, Warhammer Online, World of Warcraft | Permalink
Posted by SynCaine

Six years = 6 bucks sale

September 2, 2010

Direct2Drive is having another sale, this time offering various games for $6 to celebrate the site’s sixth anniversary. Now when the cost of entry is $6, it’s kind of hard to argue ‘value’ here. I mean I’ve spend more than that on a single League of Legends skin, so the real question is “would I actually play this?”

I’ve always had a strange fascination with Titan Quest, if for no other reason than it being a really great Diablo-like game that for one reason or another, I just never picked up (played and enjoyed the demo a while back though). The thing holding me back now is the fact that it’s 2010, and while Titan Quest looked good when it was released, it won’t blow anyone away today. Then there is the consideration of how well the gameplay has aged. What was fun back in the D2 days might not be nearly as fun today. Or maybe it will be. Choices…

The other title of interest for me is Tropico 3. I’ve always enjoyed Sim City-style games, and I’ve never played a Tropico title, so for $6 this seems like a good time to give it a shot. It’s not a really old game, so graphically it should still be more than fine, and from what I’ve read the gameplay is very solid. The nice thing about such games is that they are easy to jump in and out of during a gaming lull, and if a few hours get filled for $6, well mission accomplished.

The other big thing holding me back is my hard drive. At 160gb, it fills up fast, and nothing is more annoying than playing “download and install” monthly to make room, especially for games that require a decent amount of patching (any MMO). I’ll be damned if I don’t get a stupid big hard drive in my next comp (although those fast SSD drives sure do look nice… damnit!), but for now, I’ve got to make due.

Anyway, if you are looking for some gaming on a discount, this is a great opportunity to pick up some titles, and it seems every Wednesday D2D will be adding (or changing?) what is available.

Chuck-o-the-day: Chuck Norris turned God into an atheist.

13 Comments | Mass Media, Random | Permalink
Posted by SynCaine

League of Legends update

September 1, 2010

League of Legends continues to dominate my gaming time, and my account is now midway through level 25 while Aria is at 15. Her current two favorite champions are Garren and Blitzcrank, while I tend to favor Amumu, Katarina, Poppy, and Master Yi (for 3v3 matches only).

There is just nothing quite as satisfying as having Aria pull someone into tower range with Blitz, pop them up, and as they come down I stun-tackle them against a wall with Poppy, delivering a Devastating Blow to finish them off. Short of using Flash to escape, its death for any champion early on, and that combo has lead to many a first-bloods or ‘surprise’ kills. The other nice thing about the combo is that Blitz continues to be a great initiator throughout the game, and with a few items Poppy becomes a single-target wrecking machine with good survivability.

I just recently picked up Master Yi, and while his performance is just average at best in a 5v5 game, he can be a real monster in 3v3. He is a total snowball character and just gets silly with the right item build and a solid start. Critting for 1000+ every other swing, swinging multiple times per second, and lifestealing 50% of the damage you deal is just great, and watching enemy champions melt in seconds never gets old. On the other hand if things don’t go well, he brings next to nothing to a team, and the fact that he is so fragile can make for some frustrating moments, especially since I generally play ‘tougher’ champions like Amumu and Poppy.

Most nights we are playing arranged team games with 4-5 people from Inquisition, and once everyone caps out at level 30, the ranked game madness will begin. I’m really looking forward to the draft selection mode used in ranked play, as it’s just another twist on an already fairly complex game to spice things up. Until then, there are still plenty of champions to learn and team strategies to master.

Civilization 5 is just weeks away, but given how steady and entertaining League of Legends has been for everyone since we started playing, I’m guessing even Civ 5 will only put a dent into how often we log on and play. With Riot (the devs) updating the game weekly with balance patches and new champions/skins, the game is rapidly expanding and improving, and so it’s no surprise that the total amount of people playing continues to increase weekly.

Chuck-o-the-day: Chuck Norris invented ice skates after he realized not everyone is born with blades attached to their feet.

8 Comments | Civilization Series, League of Legends, PvP | Permalink
Posted by SynCaine

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