Comments on: The Future of MMOs http://www.killtenrats.com/2007/12/28/the-future-of-mmos/ a group of adventurers on an epic quest Tue, 07 Oct 2008 14:09:00 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.6.2 By: Nick http://www.killtenrats.com/2007/12/28/the-future-of-mmos/#comment-25378 Nick Fri, 04 Jan 2008 01:52:18 +0000 http://www.killtenrats.com/2007/12/28/the-future-of-mmos/#comment-25378 We all know that MMOs are not running at their full potential, and we know the many reasons why companies choose not to give us 100%. I'll play any MMO that has a radically different combat/skill/level mechanism. Level grinding must go. Let me get to the endgame content already! (this would also make powerleveling services kind of useless) And most of all, Consumable Content: A Persistent world that constantly changes. I want those ten rats to stay dead! We all know that MMOs are not running at their full potential, and we know the many reasons why companies choose not to give us 100%.

I’ll play any MMO that has a radically different combat/skill/level mechanism.

Level grinding must go. Let me get to the endgame content already!
(this would also make powerleveling services kind of useless)

And most of all, Consumable Content: A Persistent world that constantly changes. I want those ten rats to stay dead!

]]> By: Marcus Riedner http://www.killtenrats.com/2007/12/28/the-future-of-mmos/#comment-25370 Marcus Riedner Mon, 31 Dec 2007 19:46:13 +0000 http://www.killtenrats.com/2007/12/28/the-future-of-mmos/#comment-25370 I'm hoping to see the slow and steady death of the level grind. I've written entire white papers on how much the level grind is a waste of time and energy for everyone involved. While we are at it, lets kill skills, subscription fees, and move everything to virtual currency and micro-transactions. I think 2008 is going to be the year of the small scale MMO eating away at the margins of the massive blockbuster MMO. That's what I hope anyhow... I’m hoping to see the slow and steady death of the level grind. I’ve written entire white papers on how much the level grind is a waste of time and energy for everyone involved. While we are at it, lets kill skills, subscription fees, and move everything to virtual currency and micro-transactions.

I think 2008 is going to be the year of the small scale MMO eating away at the margins of the massive blockbuster MMO. That’s what I hope anyhow…

]]> By: Guy http://www.killtenrats.com/2007/12/28/the-future-of-mmos/#comment-25367 Guy Sun, 30 Dec 2007 23:18:12 +0000 http://www.killtenrats.com/2007/12/28/the-future-of-mmos/#comment-25367 One thing that hasn't been mentioned yet that I would like to see: Friendly fire for ranged attacks. The collision detection allows the use of formations of melee troops, but I think allowing people to fire ranged attacks at this confused melee *without* the possibility of hitting your own side will lead to boring battles with an overabundance of ranged attackers. It will mean the melee classes will be relegated to tanking each other while the real DPS always gets done by the ranged troops. I also agree with getting rid of mid-combat healing. Healers, being magic-users, can be doing more interesting things, and then heal when everyone regroups between skirmishes. One thing that hasn’t been mentioned yet that I would like to see:

Friendly fire for ranged attacks. The collision detection allows the use of formations of melee troops, but I think allowing people to fire ranged attacks at this confused melee *without* the possibility of hitting your own side will lead to boring battles with an overabundance of ranged attackers. It will mean the melee classes will be relegated to tanking each other while the real DPS always gets done by the ranged troops.

I also agree with getting rid of mid-combat healing. Healers, being magic-users, can be doing more interesting things, and then heal when everyone regroups between skirmishes.

]]> By: Braack http://www.killtenrats.com/2007/12/28/the-future-of-mmos/#comment-25361 Braack Sat, 29 Dec 2007 23:15:53 +0000 http://www.killtenrats.com/2007/12/28/the-future-of-mmos/#comment-25361 I think anyone who has spent years playing MMO's has their "Dream Game" built in their head. So many thoughts here but will just pull a few major ones out. 1) Collision detection. Is a must have, especially any game that has PVP. Watching people jump through other people and glitch 360 during battles in current non CD MMO's a la some sort of seizure is annoying and ruins gameplay. Carefully done, as any MMO mechanic of course, do avoid abuse. (CD in contested areas only, not safe towns, etc.) 2) Slow combat down. I know that sounds silly, but I want to see more strategy in combat and not just twitch button mashing. Things can still happen fast so its not boring, just not so fast that basically you just hammer buttons and hope you did the right things. I should be able to get a hint of what my advesary(ies) are doing and try to react the right way. 3) Change how damage is dealt and "healed". I hate it right now, crap animations, get hit 50+ times, get healed through 40x of it, then finally die. Combat needs to be epic, and getting hit needs to have penalties. I'm thinking Lord of The Rings (the movies, not the games). Tons of parries, blocks, and dodges. When you do land a hit, its a kill, or at bare minimum a reduction of ability depending on how good of a hit it was. Keep in mind, this won't change much from how games work currently, instead of getting hit 15x in 20 swings and your hitpoints slowly deplete, you now get hit 4x in 20 swings and your hp drops fast on those hits. Make battles feel more epic and skillful like you see in the movies. I agree, healing and recovery should be done after the fight, so you are still forced to manage your resources during. 4) Make leveling simple. VERY simple. Focus all content on the end game. Instead of leveling 70-80 levels before really experiencing the game and the content, make those 70-80 levels go by in 1/5th the time and instead of 20% of the game world being used at the end levels, make it 80% at the end levels, (and 20% of the world used for leveling). Leveling faster isn't bad. New people can hop in and join more easily, and developers can focus their time and ideas towards a truely dynamic and incredible life at max level, instead of 90% of the quests pre max level, etc. 5) Use math to balance classes. Class balance has always been horribly broken in every MMO. I haven't ever played a balanced game. I am no math wizard, but the entire game is based on a math model, so hire some MIT folks to break down algorithms to show that if class A has x dps capability, y damage mitigation capability, z CC ability, and w special abilities, that there has to be some sort of formula to balance every class against each other. I think anyone who has spent years playing MMO’s has their “Dream Game” built in their head. So many thoughts here but will just pull a few major ones out.

1) Collision detection. Is a must have, especially any game that has PVP. Watching people jump through other people and glitch 360 during battles in current non CD MMO’s a la some sort of seizure is annoying and ruins gameplay. Carefully done, as any MMO mechanic of course, do avoid abuse. (CD in contested areas only, not safe towns, etc.)

2) Slow combat down. I know that sounds silly, but I want to see more strategy in combat and not just twitch button mashing. Things can still happen fast so its not boring, just not so fast that basically you just hammer buttons and hope you did the right things. I should be able to get a hint of what my advesary(ies) are doing and try to react the right way.

3) Change how damage is dealt and “healed”. I hate it right now, crap animations, get hit 50+ times, get healed through 40x of it, then finally die. Combat needs to be epic, and getting hit needs to have penalties. I’m thinking Lord of The Rings (the movies, not the games). Tons of parries, blocks, and dodges. When you do land a hit, its a kill, or at bare minimum a reduction of ability depending on how good of a hit it was. Keep in mind, this won’t change much from how games work currently, instead of getting hit 15x in 20 swings and your hitpoints slowly deplete, you now get hit 4x in 20 swings and your hp drops fast on those hits. Make battles feel more epic and skillful like you see in the movies. I agree, healing and recovery should be done after the fight, so you are still forced to manage your resources during.

4) Make leveling simple. VERY simple. Focus all content on the end game. Instead of leveling 70-80 levels before really experiencing the game and the content, make those 70-80 levels go by in 1/5th the time and instead of 20% of the game world being used at the end levels, make it 80% at the end levels, (and 20% of the world used for leveling). Leveling faster isn’t bad. New people can hop in and join more easily, and developers can focus their time and ideas towards a truely dynamic and incredible life at max level, instead of 90% of the quests pre max level, etc.

5) Use math to balance classes. Class balance has always been horribly broken in every MMO. I haven’t ever played a balanced game. I am no math wizard, but the entire game is based on a math model, so hire some MIT folks to break down algorithms to show that if class A has x dps capability, y damage mitigation capability, z CC ability, and w special abilities, that there has to be some sort of formula to balance every class against each other.

]]> By: xwn http://www.killtenrats.com/2007/12/28/the-future-of-mmos/#comment-25360 xwn Sat, 29 Dec 2007 23:11:51 +0000 http://www.killtenrats.com/2007/12/28/the-future-of-mmos/#comment-25360 Make combat more interactive, that means, don't just push buttons that launch certain actions. Make it more like a 3rd-person-hack'n'slay; something along the lines of Heretic 2, Enclave or many, many console rpgs - or Mortal Kombat, Dead or Alive etc. - different attacks, blocks, counters, combos etc. In short: Make a game where skill is not a number. Make combat more interactive, that means, don’t just push buttons that launch certain actions. Make it more like a 3rd-person-hack’n’slay; something along the lines of Heretic 2, Enclave or many, many console rpgs - or Mortal Kombat, Dead or Alive etc. - different attacks, blocks, counters, combos etc. In short: Make a game where skill is not a number.

]]> By: Jezebeau http://www.killtenrats.com/2007/12/28/the-future-of-mmos/#comment-25350 Jezebeau Sat, 29 Dec 2007 04:15:28 +0000 http://www.killtenrats.com/2007/12/28/the-future-of-mmos/#comment-25350 I've been wanting the "Armed, Armored, and In Your Way" tank style for quite some time. I know Warhammer Online has put collision detection in, but I haven't seen the beta yet, so it's all hopes at this point. I’ve been wanting the “Armed, Armored, and In Your Way” tank style for quite some time. I know Warhammer Online has put collision detection in, but I haven’t seen the beta yet, so it’s all hopes at this point.

]]> By: gattsuru http://www.killtenrats.com/2007/12/28/the-future-of-mmos/#comment-25348 gattsuru Sat, 29 Dec 2007 00:46:58 +0000 http://www.killtenrats.com/2007/12/28/the-future-of-mmos/#comment-25348 The most certain thing I see : - Better, reactive, animations. It's been long overdue, but hasn't really hit yet. Modern MMO fights look foolish and boring simply because few people are willing to spend the time to actually produce more than one or two per weapon or even weapon type. Decreasing cost of skeletal animation or mocap, combined with the increasing cost of other types of art, should make this a very attractive thing to change. Beyond that, my major wagers are that new MMOs will play down raiding, that the tank/DPS/healing series will continue to thrive outside the few places that replace it with tankdamage/buffer/damagedebuffer, far too many games will try to focus on pure PvP without grind and fail completely, and DikuMud and DikuMud IN SPACE! will remain the overwhelmingly popular developer options. DikuMud and DikuMud IN SPACE! will also make a majority of the stuff to market, but not by nearly the same degree as game developers try to release. The most certain thing I see :

- Better, reactive, animations. It’s been long overdue, but hasn’t really hit yet. Modern MMO fights look foolish and boring simply because few people are willing to spend the time to actually produce more than one or two per weapon or even weapon type. Decreasing cost of skeletal animation or mocap, combined with the increasing cost of other types of art, should make this a very attractive thing to change.

Beyond that, my major wagers are that new MMOs will play down raiding, that the tank/DPS/healing series will continue to thrive outside the few places that replace it with tankdamage/buffer/damagedebuffer, far too many games will try to focus on pure PvP without grind and fail completely, and DikuMud and DikuMud IN SPACE! will remain the overwhelmingly popular developer options.

DikuMud and DikuMud IN SPACE! will also make a majority of the stuff to market, but not by nearly the same degree as game developers try to release.

]]> By: Bizz http://www.killtenrats.com/2007/12/28/the-future-of-mmos/#comment-25347 Bizz Sat, 29 Dec 2007 00:35:08 +0000 http://www.killtenrats.com/2007/12/28/the-future-of-mmos/#comment-25347 My hopes for MMORPG's in the future do not necesarilly lie with the combat. I agree that some improvements should be made especially to make it fun to play all classes. However in the MMO's i've played up until now i have not been bothered by the classic trinity of Tank/Healer/DPS&CC. What does bother me however is the lack of evolving stories. In my ideal MMO there are cities that are built, hamlets raised and razed, kings killed, governments elected and overthrown. I want the story on my server to progress in a different direction than the story on the other servers. Also i'd like to see the proffesion system changed. The main maincharacter you make is a hero, but is it realistic to expect him/her to also be a proficient jewelcrafter or a miner? A solution to this would be to introduce a family/dynasty strucure to MMO's. You have some heroes and next to those you create proffesion characters. For instance a miner, tailor, blacksmith... All these different characters pool the resources they gather. Your skills in these proffesions will not progress by timeinvestment only; rather, you complete minigames in instances which also takes out some of the time = progess principle. In my ideal MMO some of the resources gathered or products made are taxed, this tax pays a part of the growth of you faction's cities. Finally i have some thoughts on character creation and evolution. In the more traditional MMO's out there, all characters of a certain race and class will be the same at the various intervals of the game, with only gear to seperate them. This should definitively change. I think there should be more variation in how your skills progress. For instance a warrior that has spent most of his levels/years in the Mountains should look and play different from the warrior of a same race that has spent his time on plains (just an example). Let them gain points in different skills as they spend more time in different types of zones. Furthermore, i think the game needs certain barriers as the game progresses. It's not realistic that all max capped mages know all the availible spells. Make exams for those capped mages that wish to advance, make it possible to achieve an archmage status for instance, that can only be achieved by succesfully completing an ingame iqtest... OK so not all players will be able to achieve that uberclass, but that's virtual life. One last thought occurs to me while writing: make factions breakable and opposing factions communicate. Based on the combined actions of all players of one race factions may be formed, which can change the dynamics of the game hugely. My hopes for MMORPG’s in the future do not necesarilly lie with the combat. I agree that some improvements should be made especially to make it fun to play all classes. However in the MMO’s i’ve played up until now i have not been bothered by the classic trinity of Tank/Healer/DPS&CC. What does bother me however is the lack of evolving stories. In my ideal MMO there are cities that are built, hamlets raised and razed, kings killed, governments elected and overthrown. I want the story on my server to progress in a different direction than the story on the other servers.
Also i’d like to see the proffesion system changed. The main maincharacter you make is a hero, but is it realistic to expect him/her to also be a proficient jewelcrafter or a miner? A solution to this would be to introduce a family/dynasty strucure to MMO’s. You have some heroes and next to those you create proffesion characters. For instance a miner, tailor, blacksmith… All these different characters pool the resources they gather. Your skills in these proffesions will not progress by timeinvestment only; rather, you complete minigames in instances which also takes out some of the time = progess principle. In my ideal MMO some of the resources gathered or products made are taxed, this tax pays a part of the growth of you faction’s cities.
Finally i have some thoughts on character creation and evolution. In the more traditional MMO’s out there, all characters of a certain race and class will be the same at the various intervals of the game, with only gear to seperate them. This should definitively change. I think there should be more variation in how your skills progress. For instance a warrior that has spent most of his levels/years in the Mountains should look and play different from the warrior of a same race that has spent his time on plains (just an example). Let them gain points in different skills as they spend more time in different types of zones. Furthermore, i think the game needs certain barriers as the game progresses. It’s not realistic that all max capped mages know all the availible spells. Make exams for those capped mages that wish to advance, make it possible to achieve an archmage status for instance, that can only be achieved by succesfully completing an ingame iqtest… OK so not all players will be able to achieve that uberclass, but that’s virtual life.
One last thought occurs to me while writing: make factions breakable and opposing factions communicate. Based on the combined actions of all players of one race factions may be formed, which can change the dynamics of the game hugely.

]]>