Who are these people spending money on Fallout Shelter?

Posted on June 24, 2015 by SynCaine

Fallout Shelter is doing rather well. Actually, it’s doing amazingly well considering the game is fully, 100% playable for free, to the point that spending money on it is almost counter-productive. Not bad for a throw-in title to help everyone get in the mood for Fallout 4.

I’m still playing it, sitting around 110 people in my vault now, and still enjoy it. It takes FOREVER to load up initially once you have a large vault, but other than that it’s a nice-enough little title.

Speaking of mobile gaming, let’s give our finger a workout and try to find HS. Scrolling… scrolling… scrolling… #27, got it. Great job New Blizzard, nailed it!

Posted in Fallout 3, iPhone | 15 Comments

Fun vs Reward

Posted on June 23, 2015 by SynCaine

Designing MMO content is, IMO, far different than designing gaming content, primarily because MMO content has to last, while other gaming content has to be as fun as possible. It may sound odd, but I don’t think you should try and make all of your MMO content as fun as possible. Allow me to explain.

We generally play MMOs far longer than we do other games. If you get 30 hours out of a ‘normal’ game, that’s considered pretty good. If you only get 30 hours out of an MMO, you likely quit long before hitting the level cap or seeing the majority of the game, which in turn means you didn’t really like it. The business is built around this as well, especially the sub model. A happy customer who only played your sub MMO for 30 hours is not a good customer.

As MMO players, we are odd beasts. We will do things we don’t really like/love (dailies, farming, travel, etc) to allow us to do the stuff we do like/love (main quests, PvP, beating raid bosses, etc). Not only that, but we will continue to do this for far, far longer than we would tolerate in a normal game. Imagine if you had to hit rocks in an sRPG for 50 hours before you could craft a half-decent weapon? You would quit that game in short order, and it would get ridiculed in reviews. In MMOs though? 50 hours to level up a crafting skill/profession is considered rather short, and in many games that timeframe is orders of magnitude longer, with thousands and thousands of players participating and accomplishing that goal.

To return to not making your content fun, I believe MMO content should be designed on a scale. On one end you have rewards, and on the other end you have fun. The more fun said content, the less rewarding it should be, while the less fun something is, the more rewarding it needs to be to stay viable/relevant.

Some MMOs already do this well. PvP in EVE is considered the fun stuff, and not only is it not directly rewarding, it’s in fact neg-sum. Sticking with EVE, mining is perhaps one of the least fun things you can do in any game, let alone an MMO, but it’s highly rewarding (not just for the ISK earned, but also because the reward comes with so little effort). Travel in an MMO is generally not fun gameplay, but it’s again easy to do and the reward is easy to see (you arrive where you want to be). Raiding is hard work with little reward initially (but learning encounters and seeing new content is fun), while farming a raid isn’t all that fun, but it’s highly rewarding.

“Syn, why not just make content rewarding AND fun?”

Content has to be balanced, in that it all should be viable to the average player. If one bit of content is ‘the best’, it not only ruins the other stuff but also gets your players into bad patterns and ultimately sees them out the door quicker. As a designer it’s important to remember that one of the worst enemies of your game are the players themselves, and it’s your job to protect them, even if that means being the adult and telling the child that he can’t have yet another candybar.

Take FATES in FFXIV for example. Many players will form groups and grind nothing but FATES. This is because fundamentally, FATES aren’t well balanced. They are a bit too rewarding for what they are; decently fun group content. It would be hard to tone down the fun of FATES (I guess you could make them longer/more grindy), but lowering the rewards would be easy. But why would SquareEnix want to do this? Because you have a lot of other great content, and the more you can spread people out, the longer it will take for someone to get bored of your game, and keeping people around is what the model is all about.

Note that this only applies to content which is expected to last. A one-off piece of content, like a story quest or special event, should be as fun as possible, and so long as the rewards don’t spoil the rest of the game (like giving you the best weapon or a massive amount of gold), all good. Those little bits of content should be highlights for the player, something to look forward to and further motivate you; a bit of long-term ‘reward’ let’s say.

Far too many MMOs get this all wrong IMO, where a lot of developer resources are spend on imbalanced content, and one or two pieces are left unchecked that everyone rushes to, consumes, looks around, and leaves because everything else seems to lacking in comparison.

Posted in EVE Online, Final Fantasy XIV, MMO design | 12 Comments

CoC: TH9 Tactics

Posted on June 22, 2015 by SynCaine

(Write-up by Delpez)

Our recent wars have shown something quite clearly: Clash of Clans is a game of skill, and the gap between skilled and unskilled is large. Two weeks ago we warred in a complete mismatch. Our opponents had more high level bases and those bases were also more advanced. Some of their TH10’s were completely maxed out, even the walls. However, from their achievements it was clear that they didn’t actually play much – those maxed bases were bought. The result was a pretty easy victory for us; they did not have the skills to complement their high level bases. It showed that buying your way to a max base is a trap. You can call it pay-to-advance, but it’s definitely not pay-to-win. In fact, because of the way the matchmaker works it’s more like pay-to-lose.

Contrast that with our most recent loss against one of the Clashheads clans. It was a decent matchup – we had more high level bases, but their bases were more advanced. Now we’re not exactly a pushover clan – we win around 80% of the time and are usually victorious in closely matched wars. They took us apart. Clashheads really showed how big a role skill plays in this game, with good attack selection and great execution. One advantage of a beating is that you can learn a lot. For instance, they showed that it is possible to 3-star almost any TH9 base. This write-up aims to list some of the tactics and trends I’ve noticed from their attacks against our TH9 bases, and hopefully it will help us improve our own TH9 attacks.

Some context first: they 3-starred every TH9 base except for Syncaine’s (a 90% 2-star). And I didn’t see a single Pekka! In fact, the serious war clans don’t recommend GoWiPe at TH9 – apparently it’s a safe 2-star but a hard 3-star, and they’re after 3-stars. So how did they attack? The following table summarizes the main attacks used against our TH9 bases. Note that many of the attacks were hybrids – hog attacks often used balloons or vice versa to take out key defenses or pull the clan troops – what I show here is the main attack after clan troops and the queen were taken care of:

Main Attack

Nr of Attacks

Hogs

7

Lavaloon

5

Mass Witches

1

That mass witch attack against Tirn was really cool, but besides that it was hogs, lava hounds and balloons all the way. The next question is how they dealt with clan troops. Every attack except one dealt with clan troops before releasing the main attack. Troops were usually pulled with balloons or hogs, taking out a defensive structure in the process. So if the main attack is balloons, they’ll use some hogs to clear an exposed air defense. If the main attack is hogs, they’ll use some balloons to destroy a couple of ground defenses. After clan troops were pulled, the next order of business is to deal with those troops and the archer queen. The following table shows how clan troops were taken care of:

Kill CC

Nr of Attacks

Killsquad

7

Shattered

4

Minions + Queen

1

Killsquad refers to a couple of barbarians, two witches, two wizards and the queen. Shattered is two golems (one in the castle), some wizards, wallbreakers and the king. Basically, all the hog attacks used Killsquad for the clan troops and Shattered for the queen (only one golem then), while all the lavaloon attacks used Shattered to deal with both clan troops and the queen. Jump spells were almost always used to core into the queen, and/or to destroy some key defenses.

The main attack was usually deployed in a surgical way. In other words, only a couple of hogs or balloons were dropped per defense. Two of the attacks used a swarm deployment, where the hogs or balloons were deployed in a line. Not a single hog attack dropped all the hogs in one or two spots, like we are prone to do. Some other observations:

Any defensive structure that is not covered by an air defense will be taken out by balloons at the start of the attack. This usually pulled the clan troops as well.

High level heroes is extremely important. A number of those 3-star attacks would not have succeeded with mid-level heroes. I’m not sure where the threshold is, but it seems to be around level 20.

Just having double bomb spots are not enough to deal with hogs. The bomb spots should be difficult to access and ideally between two defenses, so the hogs would have to run through the bombs. Some of the attacks cleared double bomb areas with balloons first, to prevent the hogs from ever having to go there.

The closer the clan castle and queen is to each other, the easier it is to kill both with Shattered. Some base designs don’t allow for this, but try and have the clan castle and queen as far apart as possible, while still central enough to make a pull difficult. Same goes for air defenses – having one next to the queen is an invitation to take out both with the Shattered tactic.

A number of hog attacks dropped a giant to pull fire, and then two or three hogs per defense. The giant absorbs enough fire to allow the hogs to clear the outer defenses with minimal casualties, before joining in the center to clean up the base. In this way four giants and twenty hogs can clear all the outer defenses.

Finally – Onehive Raids have some amazing videos describing these attacks in detail. Especially those covering surgical hogs and The GoWiPe Rut (making the case why GoWiPe sucks!) Just on that, I believe GoWiPe is still viable as a safe 2-star option until your troops and heroes are high enough to start attempting 3-stars. It can also be quite devastating against anti-dragon TH8 bases.

Posted in Clash of Clans | 9 Comments

Darkest Dungeon Review

Posted on June 19, 2015 by SynCaine

Darkest Dungeon is kicking my ass. A lot of games are billed as being brutally hard or difficult, but few make that experience as enjoyable as this game. I’ve said before I’m not a huge rogue-like fan, and while DD is certainly that at heart, it’s also so so much more.

The key to my enjoyment so far has been the mix of long-term planning, short-term tactics, and the role luck plays in both. It also helps that the setting/mood are amazing; the graphics are fantastic and fit, and the sound is some of the best in any recent game in terms of pulling you in. Just hearing “A small victory, yet a victory non-the-less” as you sit on the edge of madness with one battle to go is the stuff that drives you insane in real life, as you watch your party die from fear in-game.

Speaking of fear, its a key mechanic, a sort of ‘second HP bar’ that doesn’t automatically heal after each dungeon run, and something that forces you to use many different characters as others are sent to the tavern or church to recover. What’s brutal about fear is its both a slow bleed (each hit you take generally increases it, as does simply being in the dungeon over time) and a potential chain collapse mechanic (going into a panic lowers your stats, raises the fear gain of others around you, which in turn might tip them into a panic). And unlike HP, where there is always a chance of survival even at zero, once the fear bar is full, you die, which in its own way fits the ‘creeping death’ theme perfectly.

The large range of character classes, each with its own selection of eight skills (you can have four active), plus the fact that each skill can only be used from certain positions, against certain other positions, makes creating a part of four always interesting. This is where the long-term planning is important; you never know who is going to make it out of a dungeon run, or who will be ready for the next one, so just putting together one group of four isn’t nearly enough. Often you are left throwing together a ragtag group, just praying they survive and get you to the next ‘turn’ in the game.

There is a TON of randomness in DD. Crit hits are huge; both when you score them (in addition to the bonus damage, they also reduce your fear) and when you get hit by one (more damage and fear). Who you can recruit each turn is random, sometimes frustratingly so, as are the starting skills and bonus/negative traits. Item drops and dungeon run rewards; random. Whether a character goes into a panic or lowers their fear and gets a bonus; random. What kind of dungeon runs you can select; random.

Yet I never feel truly out of control in the game, which is why its so brilliant. A wide range of class combinations can work, you just have to tinker with their skills and set something good up. Healing and curing characters can get expensive, but you also have a lot of non-random ways to manage your gold, both in how much you bring in (full clear a dungeon or leave as soon as you can?) and how much you spend (how much food you bring, how aggressively you cure/heal your characters). Combat randomness happens, but how you react to it is incredibly important, especially during boss fights, which themselves are both terrifying and incredibly rewarding.

A bit of caution; expect to fail and ‘not get it’ for a bit. The learning curve for the game is deceptively steep, and initially it can feel like the game is overly random. It’s not, but you first have to get a feel for everything and get your feet planted before you make any serious progress. It’s worth it though, as the game will continue to reward your mastery with new layers of challenge and surprise. Very highly recommended.

Edit: The game is early access, but I’ve yet to run into a single bug, and the amount of content and completeness right now beats a lot of fully released games, so don’t let that tag scare you off.

Posted in Uncategorized | 8 Comments

SW:TOR – Good enough to be a sub MMO again?

Posted on June 17, 2015 by SynCaine

Two observations about the ‘big’ SW:TOR expansion announcement (based only on reading Rohan mostly, since lulz actually playing SW:TOR):

Bit early to call SW:TOR trying to save itself here as it going the FFXIV route. FFXIV isn’t special in so much that SquareEnix made major changes, but that it’s by far the most successful MMO released in recent years, and that it may already be the largest MMO out in terms of total subscribers. Lots of MMOs have released large updates or overhauls; but few saw significant improvement/gains. Given the overall history of SW:TOR (hotbars! Get your hotbars!), let’s see what this really brings. Emphasis is still being placed on the 4th pillar from what I can tell, and we all know how well that worked out the first time.

The more significant bit IMO is the heavy leaning back towards the subscription model. SW:TOR launched as a sub game, it wasn’t very good, and as all not-very-good MMOs, it went F2P. The other side of that coin, the one rarely seen, is that when an MMO gets ‘good enough’, it has the option to come back to the major leagues and return to the sub model (Allods). Let’s assume this update is a major positive step for SW:TOR, can it get ‘good enough’ to be a sub MMO again? That would be something.

Posted in RMT, SW:TOR | 20 Comments

Fallout Shelter and Fallout 4 additional thoughts

Posted on June 16, 2015 by SynCaine

Let’s talk Fallout Shelter first. For a free game (and it is free, as buying extra boxes is truly a dummy trap to skip playing the game, nothing more), its not bad, and certainly worth downloading and messing around with. How long you play it depends on how much you like this style of game, and how crazy you are about the Fallout setting. I’m a fan of both, so I’m pretty into it.

Ultimately, as presented, it is a time waster similar to Progress Quest. There is certainly some decision making, such as were to place rooms, when to expand or upgrade them, who to assign to rooms, and how you equip your vault dwellers, but once you do that, the game is mostly about seeing how things unfold and progressing forward.

The one strange thing about the game is a lot of things only happen when you have it open (events, major resource shifts), while other things happen in real-time (wasteland exploring, child aging). I think the game would be better overall if everything was designed around having the game open, with no progress happening when the app was closed.

Moving on to Fallout 4. As I’ve said before I’m most excited about the Boston setting, since that’s home for me in the real world. Can’t wait to see Fenway Park and MIT in the Fallout world, along with a lot of other locations. I can also see why some might be bothered by the graphics not being bleeding-edge stuff, but I don’t think they look ‘bad’ or will distract from the experience, plus mods will make things better anyway. Fallout 3 today is still a gem, despite its more aged graphics, so I’m more than fine with how Fallout 4 looked in the presentation videos.

Far more importantly, I think the gameplay improvements we saw were awesome. The crafting, where you can finally break things down to be used for a larger variety of things, is a huge step forward, and is complimented perfectly by the vastly expanded crafting options in terms of weapon and armor mods. I’m really hoping this finally takes crafting from feeling like an unfinished side thing (Fallout 3 and NV) to making scavenging around the world and finding all those random bits more of a focus.

I’m also hopeful that the housing shown fits into the above as well, and has some real meat to it. We saw raiders attacking and being shot at by defenses (very cool, very tower defense), and the building/placing aspect seemed like a solid improvement over Skyrim’s housing, but I’m still not convinced that at release this will be a major focus for players to really sink their teeth into. That said, either an expansion or mods likely will fill in those potential gaps.

The rest of what was shown was all good, and exactly what I want from Fallout 4. I some ways I just want more of what Fallout 3 was, but improved/expanded for 2015, and that’s what Fallout 4 looks like it is. The fact that Bethesda fooled some by putting the pre-order up, and then revealing at E3 that the game is basically ready to go, was brilliant. Also very surprising that in this day and age, they were able to keep the fact that they have been working on the game for years a secret.

My threshold for what I spend $60 on in gaming continues to rise thanks to Steam and other factors, but Fallout 4 is a no-brainer pre-order. Yea at launch it will have some bugs, that’s basically a given, but unless they are major game-breakers (didn’t experience that with Skyrim), I’m ok with it. Especially since you know Fallout 4 is going to be a game you play through multiple times, with future expansions/dlc and over the years with various mods, so getting in that first, pure run with the game along with the rest of the world is something I don’t want to miss.

Posted in Fallout 3 | 6 Comments

Fallout 4 info and the mobile game

Posted on June 15, 2015 by SynCaine

As most of us predicted, given it was up for pre-order on Steam, Fallout 4 is coming later this year. The full 2+ hour E3 presentation can be seen here (talking starts at 26min, Fallout 4 around 1hr), and you can get pre-hyped with the Fallout mobile game (yet another reason why Bethesda is like Old Blizzard, the Fallout app is #1 right now on the apple charts, unlike the release of HS).

Can. Not. Wait.

Posted in iPhone, Random | 2 Comments

Darkest Dungeon mini-review

Posted on June 13, 2015 by SynCaine

Darkest Dungeon is absolutely kicking my ass. Some times things turn ugly on the first run, before I even open the various buildings. Either I’m doing something (a lot of things) wrong, or the game is just brutal. Fun game though, and doesn’t feel like a ‘traditional’ rogue-like.

Posted in Random | 8 Comments

Steam summer sale reminder

Posted on June 11, 2015 by SynCaine

If you want to be a nice person and sent me some/all of your Steam cards as a ‘thank you’ for all the countless entertainment I provide you, that would be much appreciated, thanks.

Trades work too.

Syncaine on Steam, friend request if we aren’t already.

Posted in Steam Stuff | 4 Comments

Bringing games to prison

Posted on June 9, 2015 by SynCaine

Via Az, what PC game would you pick if you were in prison for 10 years with no internet, and what three games would you pick if you were locked up for life but had Internet to play games but no web?

For me this is simple.

Mount and Blade: Warband + all DLC/mods is such an easy choice for scenario one, I’m more concerned that I wouldn’t have enough time in that ten years to finish doing everything. Civ V was also in the running, but really it’s a landslide toward M&B.

Scenario two is also pretty easy IMO.

First choice is EVE. You know its going to last, it has infinite content, you realistically COULD play it 23/7, and being awesome/addicted to EVE would mean you are critically involved in so much of the very best stuff.

Game two would be LoL, mostly as a break from EVE, but also because you know its going to last, get updated, and is a gaming formula that is proven to hold up.

Third option was more difficult for me only because I would be perfectly fine with just EVE and LoL, but I think at this point I’d go with FFXIV simply because of the content depth and pace of updates. At least in prison with EVE and LoL, I wouldn’t burn through FFXIV all that quickly, and the more relaxed pace would be a good break from the other two.

Posted in Civilization Series, EVE Online, Final Fantasy XIV, Mount and Blade: Warband | 5 Comments