Archive for the ‘MMO’ Category
“We’re CCP! We march on fearlessly!”
Indeed they do.
What Would Matt Do: Well, I guess I’d really like to play the game that they make that doesn’t require me to a good book to read…when they make that game, let me know. Until then, I’ll agree, HARDEN THE FUCK UP!
I’m tired of being so negative, but CCP is really making me angry!
I haven’t been posting as much, as you may or may not have noticed. That isn’t so much because I haven’t wanted to, but more because I wanted to shift the focus of the site. Mainly just from the angry tone to a more mindful one. It is what it is.
That said, fuck CCP. How dare they try to make me break my no MMOs on the console rule. Much less my general lack of interest in FPS (CoD4 and any FPS you can play coop exluded…of course) games on the console. How are they doing it? By do something not many in the industry are even aware you can do, trying something different. That’s right, they are going to attempt a new idea. They will take an FPS with RTS attributes and tie it into their already existing MMO. They claim the following:
The team-based game has the player "fighting in a massive war" on existing planets in the EVE Online universe, and is a standalone MMO title, "but is also connected to EVE," according to the CCP boss.
In fact, when Dust 514 launches, the map of EVE, currently divined only by player structures owned in the PC game, will also take into account infantry successes and failures within the console game. Players in the PC MMO can "fund mercenaries and give them goals" in the console title.
CCP’s Petursson hope that "these communities will meld over time," expecting specific Dust 514 corporations to start with, but eventually social structures that bridge across the two. He quipped of the new game and the relationship between the two titles: "While the fleet does the flying, the infantry does the dying."
As I’m reading The Prince even (four books all about the future of humans and the military exploits of one John Christian Falkenburg. It’s a history of the universe created in The Mote In God’s Eye, another must read. The Prince is a great read if you like military and sci fi. Also does a very interesting and greatly detailed look at future and social issues), so I’m already in sci-fi military mood. What a bunch of complete shits to try something so interesting, one MMO linked to another, with the second being the land battles of the first (at least in theory), that I’m going to have to pay serious attention and maybe break my own personal rules on console gaming.
God, I can’t stand these CCP bastards.
What Would Matt Do: So that better, right?
Since when do they let 13 year old UO PKers be professors?
I was going to go into a whole rant a few days back when I first read about "Twixt" and his alter ego. Glad I didn’t since Lum managed to skewer him not once but twice.
In short, the guy PKed everyone using guards in the game to kill them. Which not only killed people, but got people a debt (takes longer to get xp) in a zone where you’re not supposed to get debt. And then? Complained that he wasn’t being treated nicely and blamed everyone else.
That’s both crazy and awesome. Awesome in that I didn’t know they let UO Pkers (the first group to use similar methods of destruction and reasoning as to why) be professors. Apparently universities are getting desperate. And crazy in that this guy is full of insane. He blames "static social laws" that people weren’t happy with him.
Yeah, those damn bastards, not wanting to be randomly killed by exploiting the game. And then the balls on those guys to blame the professor/twixt. He was just playing how the game allowed him, how can they be upset?
I can’t wait to see him try to apply that logic in real life.
What Would Matt Do: Laugh and laugh and laugh at this guy and Lum’s great coverage.
In a stunner, we find that user generated content isn’t easy
I’m sure Cryptic Studios HAD to think about the potential problems of adding user generated content (quests that the players create) to their system.
But I’m betting they didn’t put enough thought in when we start getting things like this happening:
When City of Heroes released its user-created mission generator, it was mere hours before highly exploitative missions existed. Players quickly found the way to min-max the system, and started making quests that gave huge rewards for little effort. These are by far the most popular missions. Actually, from what I can tell, they are nearly the only missions that get used. Aside from a few “developer’s favorite” quests, it’s very hard to find the “fun but not exploitative” missions, because they get rated poorly by users and disappear into the miasma of mediocrity.
None of that is surprising, or it shouldn’t be if you’ve played any online game recently. I can’t speak for the majority of players, but enough players to make it a problem will always try to exploit your system. Especially in something like City of Heroes where leveling is SLOW. Why would I, as a player, play the game the normal way when I could load up one of the user generated missions and get some serious experience from doing it?
I hate to break this to MMO developers, but most of your quests are extremely boring. Most people will do a few or more and then try to figure out the fastest way to level within the given system. MMOs require you to put time into the game to succeed, so as a player your obviously going to be looking to lessen the hit to your time. Whether we’re talking cheating or not is basically left up the readiness of cheats and the specific person.
So when you add user generated content, especially user generated content that is allowed to have an experience reward, you’re going to have people that will make levels to be exploited and people that will play those levels. More than enough to make it a big blip in your leveling curve. Guaranteed.
There are possible solutions, but almost nothing is going to work long term unless you don’t allow any kind of reward from the user generated quests. Or you have a guy examining every single quest that goes through and if it doesn’t meet public posted guidelines, then it’s rejected. Of course, you’re going to get a guy to do that and you’re going to need publicly posted guidelines:
Bingo. You don’t know if you’re breaking the rules until you get punished. So the developers are creating a chilling effect on their own content generator. Now it’s risky for players to even use user-created quests. What if some customer service rep decides the quest is exploitative? You’d retroactively lose your XP. It’s best to just to stick to the old dev-made quests, the ones you know won’t get you punished.
I haven’t got confirmation that they actually removing XP from players at this point, but I have heard from players that they are rejecting missions/quests and potentially not giving back a slot to make another/more.
I’m pulling for Cryptic for no other reason than I hope more games will try to do this. I’d love to log into an MMO and be able to pick from a list of quests created and reviewed by fellow players. Because every single MMO existence is lacking in good content, especially if we aren’t talking about the same four or five multiplayer components being played over and over…
What Would Matt Do: I’d try to do a few things. One, just set an arbitrary experience limit on user generated content based on the level required to play it (as one potential solution for the immediate problem). Two, start thinking outside the box for the next MMO on how to allow user generated quests AND content from the start, instead of adding onto an already existing system that it wasn’t really intended to be in the first place. Three, hope for the best…and prepare for the worst. Meaning, hope your players are going to create incredible, awesome, amazing quests and prepare for them to exploit every little thing they can. Because they will do both of those.
EQ2 Player? You’re probably a well educated man who is depressed.
Ok, before you do anything else, check out the image I borrowed from Gamespy’s article to the right.
Done? Some quick observations can be drawn. First, it looks like 20% of the players are female. I didn’t expect it to be that high. Second, compared to the general population, EQ2 player are a lot more depressed. Third, they are thinner than the general pop.
Highly interesting stuff. But it only leads to a LOT more questions. One, does this kind of demographic apply across all MMOs? Does it extend to other types of online games? We know the age is a pretty normal for video games these days, so does the rest of the information hold across the board?
Another question occurs to me…how does Sony know all of this about their players? Did the research staff get access to players and get to ask them more questions? Because if not, I’m now wondering what exactly Sony does keep track of. How would they know the BMI or education level? Do they know what I had for breakfast too?
Whatever the case is, this is some highly interesting stuff. Because it goes a ways to disproving the normal geek myths. It makes me want to ask so many other questions. For instance, are all gamers so depressed? In both women and men, it’s a LOT more than the general population in this study. I wonder.
If I were reading this as a potential advertiser, I’d be gleaning a lot. If were reading this is a game designer, I’d be gleaning a lot. So will anyone pay attention to this information at all? The sad, but most likely true, answer is no.
What Would Matt Do: I’d love to see this sort of info on all MMOs, and compared to country specific and worldwide data. On a side note, if Empire doesn’t shape up soon (i.e. – quit crashing on me), I’m going to give it quite the stinging review on this very site. I’m loving it, when the game doesn’t crash every third turn.