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Through Wolfy's Eyes

~ One gamer's view of the forest and the trees

Through Wolfy's Eyes

Tag Archives: themepark

Blaugust Day 27 – Side Dishes

27 Thursday Aug 2015

Posted by wolfyseyes in MMO Things

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

main quest, pve, questing, side dish, side quest, story, swtor, themepark, xiv, xp

This post was prompted by Syp’s excellent post about SWTOR, but I was otherwise diverted from posting this by other, shinier topics that came to mind.

Image courtesy dreamstime

“Dooood….”

In it, he discussed his feelings on the planetary missions of SWTOR and how the 12x Experience Boost for current subscribers rendered all of that work obsolete.  Is that such a bad thing, though?  In my mind, it isn’t.  And SWTOR isn’t the only one that could benefit from this design idea.

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The Life Pastoral

28 Tuesday Oct 2014

Posted by wolfyseyes in MMO Things

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

combat, crafting, MMO, sandbox, themepark

In my continued wanting for a sandbox game, I had noticed something of a recurring habit of mine.  This started way back in the first forays into EVE Online.  I would spend hours jumping from system to system in my blocky little Gallente frigate and chew on individual space rocks, soar over to the nearest station and refine the ore to sell on the market.  Mine wasn’t a glamorous capsuleering life, but it was rewarding.  I enjoyed just being allowed to go out there, do a few peaceful chores, making a reasonable amount of space-coin and calling it a night.

Grindy as hell, sure…but…idyllic.  Soothing.  It was the quiet moments between casting a fishing line and the hurry when your bait was snagged.  I loved that.

The Repopulation, Camelot Unchained, EQ Next, ArcheAge…these titles all have the same effect on me–the want to turn swords to plowshares.  To live a simple existence of the journeyman crafter or harvester.  Maybe a travelling salesperson or shopkeep selling my wares.  Instead, the MMOs that are out now all demand combat.  Sure, the games I play like ESO or XIV or WildStar have crafting professions, but they play second fiddle to the combat.  Ignoring the combat a lot of the time is like being asked to try Frosted Flakes, and then when I’d rather not Tony the Tiger gets in my face.

“They’re grrrre-EAT THE FLAKES YOU LITTLE SHITLORD!”

It never really occurred to me that MMO gaming should be more than being a blade in a blender until I started reading up more on Camelot Unchained’s idea of crafting principles.  Not only were these ideas robust and impressive, but it meant that I could actually be what I wanted to become.  A journeyman craftsman.  I could contribute to the game’s goals and others’ progression without forcing myself into combat all the damn time.

Here we have someone who recognizes that combat has to be supported by an actual set of resources.  It always kinda baffles me when people don’t find crafting in their MMOs important, or that game devs don’t pour more attention to this sort of activity, but then those same folks don’t bat an eye at the logistical nightmare fueling a realm-wide war requires.  Here, someone not only considered that, but they actually designed tools and playstyles for the player to fill that void.

It’s why I pounced on the chance to support Pumpkin Online as well.  I was worried beyond belief that it wouldn’t make its goal, but it has, and I truly hope that it presses on.  Not only were the concepts of inclusion and representation important to me, but an entire MMO specifically geared to making one just enjoy a peaceful farming life is something I had never heard tried.  I support ambition like that.  I slap ambition like that with my wallet.

This was the best I could find with a “wallet slap” search. Sorry.

The common complaint with themepark MMOs is that every single player is The Chosen One.  Some games tried to work their way around this narrative pitfall, but it still ultimately didn’t work out or was just never fully followed through.  Now, themeparks are fun and great rides and I enjoy them too…but it would be really damned nice if I could be one of those NPCs.  Or at least do the things they do.

Even single player games have tried to make this idea work to varying degrees of success.  Remember the repeatedly touted feature of Radiant AI in Oblivion?  All that ended up doing is giving NPCs the same boring pathed tasks, but with the inclusion of a steely-eyed level of determination that would be noble if it weren’t…well….freaking creepy.  EverQuest Next’s recent talk about the Storybricks technology and how dynamic things are in their game sounds good on paper, but I’m almost sure I can see the same dance steps if I squint and tilt my head just so.

Of course, it’s not all shallow promises.  There are games out there that have made living a normal life part of the game.  One of the best examples of this I’ve played was the game Recettear: An Item Shop’s Tale.  Here we had a game that focused solely on maintaining, stocking and manning the item shop we’ve all seen in those classic RPGs.  Unfortunately, even that game was sure that people wouldn’t buy in to it, and included a damned combat dungeon crawler in there too.

....godammit.

….godammit.

Now the thing is, this type of gameplay is wanted, but it still has to feel like fun.  There still should be a level of skill and engagement and actual, direct, tactile input here.  XIV’s crafting, for as ultimately pointless as it seems due to the dungeons-only endgame and repeatedly layered tiers of gearscore required, has one of THE BEST crafting minigames out there.  I was cranking out vendor trash gleefully because I had to focus and use active skills.  I was in combat with an inanimate object…which sounds stupid, but it was engaging.

Ultimately, my point is that we all shouldn’t be forced into the combat field.  Some of us would rather help in other ways that don’t involve being a tank or a healer because the Dungeon Finder Netherbeast is endlessly hungry.  Some of us are completely ice-cold cool with being the NPC locked in an endless animation of tanning a hide in the hub city.  Some of us think that it’d be cool to actually cry out in the town to shop our store instead of endlessly spamming a trade channel for a thing we posted in a cold Auction House.

Someone has to make all those endless swords and shields.  Random squirrels in the field can’t be expected to drop them all the time.  We can supply the demand.  I think a fair few of us actually want to.

“This little bastard had better drop a new chestpiece, I swear to GOD.”

The Shifting Paradigm

05 Friday Sep 2014

Posted by wolfyseyes in MMO Things

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

angry ferrets, crowdfunding, MMO, pvp, sandbox, themepark

As I stated before in my prior post, choices are wonderful, and what’s out now are wonderful choices.  That said, I have to take a small bit of agreement with those who believe that MMOs are stagnating, design-wise.  At least the current crop of releases.  I enjoy looking out the same window when it has pretty enough drapes hanging in front of it, but there is something to be said for replacing that window or changing up the actual view outside.

ffxiv_09282013_223637

The only way this isn’t a trope is my screaming yellow armor.

So as much as I enjoy themeparks, their rides and even the stories they tell…it’s nice to see the winds of change beginning to blow across the MMO landscape.  And it’s not just sandboxes either.  We’re seeing sandbox and game designs that focus on a playstyle, a dynamic, or building a captivating world that you can live in.

I’ll admit that my expectations were tempered with cynicism.  The only other sandbox experience I’ve had is EVE Online, and that was just a level of horror and pain on a psychological front that was so jarring and so damaging that it has continued to steer my view of sandbox games and their designs to the realm of worst case scenario.  The interest of self-preservation has taken over my instincts to the point where it’s irrational.  I hated EVE.  I hate the way it made me feel.  I hate that the simple act of flying my chunky metal lunchbox from point A to point B carried the risk of someone blowing me to smithereens and the only protection against it was a money sink when I barely had any money.  It’s why I dislike any PvP-related game, be it an MMO or most modern shooters or a MOBA.  The idea of being wrecked and ridiculed isn’t my concept of a good time.  It’s akin to entering a small box full of angry ferrets.

“Manage your f**king lane, noob!”

So what is it that made me change my mind?  A personal New Year’s resolution, actually.

I realize how completely stupid that sounds, but allow me to explain.  By the time New Year’s came around I was up to my neck in Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn.  I was having a great time.  But I also felt that switching things up would be a good idea…so I promised myself that I would try to get in to one of these sandbox games that I’d read about coming down the pipe and find out what all the huge fuss was genuinely about. I would work to battle against my prior prejudices in the interest of getting my feet wet.  I usually say “You can’t hate it without knowing it”, so it was time to put my money where my mouth was.

The first of these games I backed was The Repopulation. My reasoning was that it was the closest to the game that a lot of people cite as “sandbox done right”: Star Wars Galaxies.  I completely missed the boat on SWG, but to hear some people opine for it you’d think that it actually issued a cloud of endorphins from your computer right into your nasal passages.  Reading about it has enticed me, too–here was an open world game that didn’t demand you PvP in order to play the way you wanted.  Sure, there were some mechanics that pretty much shoehorned one into that playstyle, and of course some managed to twist the game mechanics to their advantage…but by and large, this was a game that, apparently, was a progenitor for sandbox MMO design and did it far more correctly than the ones out currently.

So I tossed the project $25 in January during its second round of crowdfunding via Kickstarter.  Initially, it was a knee-jerk maneuver: the game was similar enough to SWG that it suited my resolution fulfillment needs, and I had the money to burn.  But as I read more and more about the game, and heard more and more about how this little project kept updating at such a steady and even pace, I found myself genuinely getting intrigued.

That got the ball rolling.

Repopulation bled in to Landmark.  Landmark in to Camelot Unchained.  Then Pumpkin Online.  MMOs that were once things I never would have dreamed of entering in to have now become places I desperately want to visit.  It hasn’t exactly cooled my love of the themepark model, but having read up about–and in some cases, explored actively–these titles has me slowly understanding what some of the genre doomsayers were on about.

“Freakin’ told you, jackass.”

Is my mind completely changed?  No, not really.  There’s a risk inherent in all of these titles: Repopulation could still end up with me entering the FFA PvP areas in order to get the best materials to craft with.  Pumpkin Online might not even make it.  But the point is, we’re seeing attempts.  We’re seeing things shuffle around and away from what’s safe or comfortable and now getting some genuine pushes against the envelope.  No matter what some of those angry ferrets above this sentence may say….this is an exciting time for the MMO genre, and I’m glad to have maybe helped usher some of that in.

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