Author: Ravious

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A Case For Massively

James at MMOCrunch brought up the upcoming game, Borderlands, which he classifies as an MMO.  Borderlands is a self-proclaimed FPS with RPG elements.  (Zubon recently discussed the “RPG” misnomer.)  Borderlands is very similar to Diablo’s style of multiplayer where players can join others’ games and the first player’s game adjusts in difficulty.  Only up to four players can join one game, and there seems to be no true persistence (even in a player hub).  Yet, James insists that it is, in his opinion, an MMO.  Going through the acronym: (1) Borderlands is multiplayer, (2) Bordlands is online, and following whatever colloquialism “RPG” means now, (3) Borderlands has some RPG elements.  So the sticking point, as is usually the case when deciding what constitutes an MMO, is whether Borderlands is considered “massive.”

 The sage Nicodemeus wrote out a classification chart two years ago to describe the thin red line between a mere multiplayer online game and one that is “massive.”  Nicodemeus wrote: “[The term “massive”] should mean that thousands of players are interacting in the same world/environment simultaneously. People that are on different *web pages* at the same site, or a game that has thousands of multiplayer games going at the same time do NOT count as massively multiplayer.”  Borderlands clearly does not fall under Nicodemeus’ definition of a massively multiplayer online game. Continue reading A Case For Massively

Beauty in Simplicity

I am glad that forthcoming MMOs are stepping back from the precipice of the uncanny valley– a revulsion to the near real.  Quite a few upcoming MMOs are hedging towards stylized graphics, ala Team Fortress 2 or dare I say World of Warcraft, which are also less taxing on system requirements than photo realistic styles.  The stylized feel for things also gives the MMO artists another opportunity in creating some artistic moments through simplicity.

Wizard 101, for example, is a very graphics light game.  It doesn’t have huge polygon counts or untold amounts of shaders, but it does have style.  It’s simple and clean, filled with teenage wizardry, and fairly evocative spells.  Even in the age of Aion and Crysis, Wizard 101 still has some moments that made me appreciate the artistic direction.  The spells are the obvious choice, but I want to focus on the level design.

In my play through Wizard City and Kroktopia most of the PvE zones have been a street or street-like tomb with buildings and props off to the side.  There is the occasional tree or sarcophagus, but the space is not really much for looking.  Most of it is actually rather mundane.  It really just sets the atmosphere.  However, in nearly each zone the level artists made sure to add a stop and stare moment.  In Wizard City it might be a portion of the zone torn asunder with pieces magically floating in the distance, or deep below in Kroktopian tombs it might be a cave with a quiet lightning storm below the skinny stalagmites the wizards stand on.  I do not think that these moments would be so evocative without the simplistic baseline the rest of the zone portrays.

Lord of the Rings Online, on the other hand, is debateably one of the most beautiful and atmospheric MMOs.  Yet, how many vistas and painstaking creations get lost in the clutter.  I was very excited to walk in to the Prancing Pony for the first time as a young lad.  I stepped through the door, saw Butterbur, and was thereafter sensually overwhelmed.   There were patron NPCs, “roleplayers,” countless tables, a fireplace, things on the wall, maybe even wooden or antler-built chandeliers.  I focused on the thing with the quest icon above its head.  Any stop and stare moment was completely lost in the business of the place.

The most picturesque moments on Lord of the Rings Online, for me, have been the interplay between the sky and the distant landscapes, or a night upon Amon Raith, or finding a quiet fishing hole.  The more active the environment whether through props or moving players or NPCs, the less stunning it becomes.

I have great respect for the artistic minds that create levels above and beyond mere game design.  The whole zone becomes a type of symphony having many active allegro and vivace moments that come from movement, combat, and realistic business, but I think it is equally important to have a holding coda as well.  The base tempo for each zone will definitely affect the spikes in either direction.

–Ravious
obliged to be industrious

Pay-By-Zone Pitfalls

This past weekend I have been going through the final hub of Kroktopia in Wizard 101.  Being a Storm Wizard, this is actually more of a challenge than the fire-based hub and ice-based hub.  I like it though.  The “epic” storyline in Wizard 101 is mostly linear, and I was hitting through Karanahn Barracks, which if I recall correctly, had one storyline quest in it and maybe five other quests.  It cost me $1.83 to play this zone if I buy 2500 crowns at a time (the cost drops to $1.22 if I buy $80 worth of crowns at a time).

The preceding three-zones (Well of Spirits, Ahnic Family Tomb, and Djeserit Family Tomb) cost me $1.83 for all three, and included three or four times the amount of quests as Karanahn Barracks.  I finished everything I could in the Barracks, to then have to buy another zone Karanahn Palace to continue the story for, again, $1.83.  Karanahn Palace is a dungeon instance, so right away it feels like there will be less than a quest zone because the dungeon instances in Wizard 101 are insulated with their own quest chains, etc.  So, I knew that once I completed the Palace, once, it would be time to move on.  Except for alts, it was likely I would never return to the Palace.  I also had to refill my crowns in order to buy Karanahn Palace, and instead I just signed off and played other games for the rest of the weekend.

Continue reading Pay-By-Zone Pitfalls

A Six Sigma Response?

Sanya Weathers at Eating Bees wrote in her seminal piece on the five things that will tank your community ‘(4) if you are a community manager that is ignoring the eighteen whiners on the boards ignoring them will hurt the community when all eighteen of them are saying the same thing.  You are the one who is wrong, not them.’  But, what is ‘not ignoring?’

There are a few shades of response a community manager or a developer can write, and unfortunately the most common seems to be something along the lines of “your concerns are noted, and have been passed along or considered.”  In my opinion, as a player, this response is only marginally better than being ignored.  I don’t understand why the responder does not employ one of the most basic of management techniques: active listening.  Repeat the players’ concerns in a condensed, polite manner, and some of the most acidic of criticizers will melt.  “Hey, this dude is on our side.”  Shocker, I know.  Plus, many community managers have to digest and reiterate player concerns to the developers anyway; might as well double-dip on the work already done.

Orion, a developer for Lord of the Rings Online, did just this in his most recent blog post.  He reiterated in a condensed version the complaints about hard mode/radiance gear/radiance gating in a few short paragraphs.  My kinship went bananas.  One of the guild leaders wrote “if he told us after [the active listening response] that it was ‘working as intended,’ I would’ve still been happy because they understand our problem.”  Well of course.  They have understood our problem all along.  Certainly there are varying levels of detail in the response, and I would submit that the more detail in the response that mirrors the actual complaint the more soothed the savage beasts will be.  Active listening in a super-condensed manner might not give the full result.

–Ravious
till Max said “be still”

Guild Wars 2 Dust Bunnies

Apart from the usual forum bickering, there has been some pretty decent detective work regarding Guild Wars 2 the past week or so.  I would like to share.

First, 4thVariety disclosed that he or she keeps notes on trademark licensing and domain registration that ArenaNet has done.  4thVariety does this by comparing the attorney NCSoft uses for ArenaNet work and other work.  Some very interesting tidbits ensue.  On April 11, 2007, BlightedEmpires.com was registered by Peter J. Wilsey, who registered other ArenaNet websites.  Guild Wars 2 was announced only two weeks earlier.  On March 12, 2009, the domain name was refreshed.  Could this possibly be the subtitle for Guild Wars 2 – a game where dragons awoke and destroyed nations? (UPDATE: This trademark has gone abandoned.)

The second interesting thing was found from voice actors’ resumes.  It seems that many voice actors are including Guild Wars 2 as work they have done.  Voice acting requires content and story (especially for “two major characters”).  Content and story are one of the final legs of development.  Concordantly… the dawn might be breaking soon.  For a poor benchmark, Warhammer Online released a video podcast on adding voice acting in March, 2008.  Warhammer Online was released September, 2008.  On the other hand, The Old Republic has started voice acting for their fully voice acted epic, which may be as far off as November 2010, or farther.

Regardless, we are going to get news later this year, possibly at the Penny Arcade Expo (PAX) on ArenaNet’s back doorstep, or likely after Aion’s launch dust settles.

–Ravious
irrevocably human

I, MMO Investor

Valve’s Gabe Newell got an interesting blog-bite about players funding games to be developed.  Reminds me of buying pork belly stock.  MMOs that follow subscription models are already halfway there.  Subscribers are not just paying for the ability to play on the MMO.  They are also expecting new patches, new content, new technology upgrades, and so on.  Even with over 5,000,000 subscribers-worth of revenue Blizzard cannot churn out content fast enough for World of Warcraft.  The game then becomes a hopeful chat room community of investors.

This just does not go for subscription MMOs, but they are the most representative.  Players expect the MMO to be a living thing whether it follows Guild Wars or Wizard 101’s business model.  Once the game begins to feel stagnant and hopes begin to die, players will flag to another ship.  It would be nice to make developer decisions like a publicly-traded shareholders meeting, but we would probably make the wrong ones anyway.

The one other “hint” of MMO investment might be in the beta stage.  This is two-pronged with one being realistic (for now).  The first prong comes from pre-orders and getting pre-release access to the game.  While the gamer usually pays the same amount for the game whether he or she pre-ordered or not, the developer/publisher gets a read on future sales.  They can use this data to further excite vendors, newssites, and fans thereby generating more sales and money.  The unrealistic prong could be asking the gamer to pay extra to get in to the testing phase.  I saw plenty of gamers that would do this without question for Warhammer Online.  Could this small amount of money help final development more than hurt future sales?  Currently the answer seems to be “no” because I haven’t seen anyone willing to use this risky business model.

I know that Newell was approaching things from a more early development standpoint.  Would you be willing to buy Blizzard’s next MMO now even if you wouldn’t get it until 2012 when you might be funding it right now by merely playing World of Warcraft?  Fool me twice…

–Ravious
either way a sale is made

Video Game Voyeurism

I’ve always liked to spectate people playing video games, ever since the ability was added in online games.  Guild Wars World Championships were to me what the World Series was to a baseball fan.  I would watch and chat with other players in observer mode  focusing on the intense Guild Versus Guild battles between the best players in the world.  Or there was that one time Nihilum did a live Sunwell Plateau (World of Warcraft) raid from four different vantage points.  Even a quick break in Team Fortress 2 to spectate a spy taking down five cart pushers can be entertaining while I chew down some air-travelled White Castles. 

I had an all-time high (or low) this weekend amassing hours of video game voyeurism via X-Fire’s live video streams.  A gamer with a good connection and computer can stream in real-time the game he or she is playing, while a chat room is created so that viewers can chat with the player and create a running peanut gallery.  This past weekend I vicariously “played” Prototype, Mass Effect, and even Darkfall.  I have never experienced any of these games, but I am already planning to buy Mass Effect.  I also have a much better feel for Darkfall watching a live stream than any “professional” reviewer can give me.  The streaming gamer is a personal performer, demoer, and spokesperson for the game.  Developers couldn’t ask for better advertising.

There was one small hitch.  The most popular and most numerous live streams seem to be World of Warcraft arena PvP.  I don’t understand this because the information to noise ratio is pitifully low when watching World of Warcraft PvP via the lowered-resolution stream.  I can only surmise that the live streams become some sort of PvP community in and of themselves.  This is not necessarily the hitch.  The hitch is I did want to see some World of Warcraft raid or dungeon, but I had to pull up each World of Warcraft stream in order to figure out what the player was showing.  Requiring a little description for each gamer’s stream would help greatly (e.g., Mass Effect just starting, WoW arenakekeke, L4D noob watch me suck).

The service is still in beta for X-Fire users, but I expect that whole communities and services could occur around this feature.  Instead of game companies performing demos at E3 for journalists, the developers could bypass and give a demo straight to the masses.  New guildies could be tutored on a raid.  Personal vendettas could be resolved.  The list is endless.  I am pretty excited about this, and maybe I will find something worthwhile to stream in the future.

–Ravious
on the arm of a blind man

Grumishing

Going off my short burst play tangent, last night I had another great experience in Wizard 101.  Below the Krokosphinx there is a hub that leads to four other areas.  However, in that area is a boss named Grumish Greataxe.  Grumish can only be summoned by players that have completed a quest chain, but once summoned anybody can join.

I signed on excited to get to the third and final hub in Kroktopia, but people were fighting Grumish.  So, I joined them because joining a boss fight can only make things better for all.  We beat him pretty good, and I got to flex my mighty-Potter pythons with lightning versus the myth boss (lightning beats myth, fire beats ice, etc.).  During the time we smacked the minotaur around a small crowd had gathered, and people in the crowd were rearing to take the boss on as well.  So, I joined again.  Then again.  I never made it to the next hub.

It was just a blast to fight this boss with a rotating group of other people knowing that I could leave at anytime between fights without anyone batting an eye.  While there is good and bad to the transient nature of grouping in Wizard 101, the emergence of this pick-up style play will rarely happen in a more traditional MMO.  I think the only other time I was this excited to just play with people at a whim was in the early days of Warhammer Online where public quests were actually populated.

I hope that true pick-up play will occur more often in the MMOs of the future.

–Ravious
a burrahobbit?

Another Dip Test

Sometimes people make pretty quick judgments.  A dip test.  That’s why the starting areas, quests, music, etc. of an MMO have to be polished to near-blinding.  What about a dip test for the game in the middle?  Many times gamers lie awake at night – not “tired” –  thinking about games.  There is some amount of activation energy required to roll out of bed, log on, and play in a way where it was meaningful to roll out of bed in the first place.  A midnight dip test.

I was also not “tired” the other night, and I wanted some quick MMO play to calm my furied mind.  Wizard 101 was the easy choice.  I could log on, warp close to a play area of choice and run there in under a minute, and log off within a 15 minute time span.  I opted, actually, to play the mini-games to refill my potions and see how high a level I could get.  Games like Wizard 101, Puzzle Pirates, and Guild Wars rule at this quick guilt-free amount of play where activities that occur are meaningful. Continue reading Another Dip Test

Nod of Camaraderie

I saw from afar a fellow student battling the undead, re-risen, or newly awakened crocodile warriors in the tombs beneath the Krokosphinx.  I was not quite sure what they were.  The genus of the creature was lost on me during lectures.  All I knew was that they turned to sand when I threw lighting at their faces.  A newt-looking Mander had asked me to defeat a few more of the Kroks, and my classmate was trying to defeat the same Kroks.  I scampered up to his battle circle, re-tooling my spell deck on the fly.  He turned  his head toward me with a grim nod.  More of the enemy would soon be joining us.

After the protracted battle involving the summoning of all manner of magical creatures, the Kroks dissolved to sand, filling the rocky cracks in the floor.  There were a few small pieces of fulgurite from all the lightning strikes I inflicted, but I pretended not to notice for the life wizard’s sake.  That was it.  The briefest of glances, the quickest of handshakes, and a tactical retreat in to the shadows of sidewalks ended our grouping.  I may meet up with him again for another painless transaction.  I can only hope the other world’s I walk will soon have means for the transient gathering requiring merely the nod of camaraderie.

–Ravious
in the end it became a triumphal march