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World Of Warcraft Diversity Explored
Thanks to RPGVault for their interview with World Of Warcraft producer Mark Kern, discussing Blizzard's forthcoming massively multiplayer RPG. He particularly stresses depth of content, especially relevant since recent allegations against Star Wars Galaxies: "I think one thing that sets us apart, aside from all the little things that go into our interface, quest-driven gameplay, and instanced dungeons, is the fact that there is so much to do in the game. This is also the key to retention. We have a huge amount and variety of places to explore that are packed with special locations, encounters, story and quests." He also discusses different play styles, saying the game will offer "..outdoor content for soloing, dungeons that offer cool loot and encourage grouping to succeed, and heavy boss encounters that require large guilds to take out."
Finally, a company that has never laid an egg in RTS or RPG-lite has entered a new field with the same old dedication to quality that is unmatched by ANYONE else out there making a MMORPG.
Uh.. hello? Have you been paying attention recently? The talent has left the building...
While it's possible WOW might not suck, it's going to be an uphill struggle for them and I'm going to remain skeptical until I read the first reviews.
I just miss FreeCraft :-(
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They got lucky twice and have made a fortune reselling those golden eggs as expansions and sequels
... When someone gets lucky this many times in a row statistics suggests that something other than luck may be involved.
...
How many companies have failed to get lucky that second time? How many companies have failed to have a sequel exceed the success of the original? How many companies failed to have an expansion pack succeed? Lucky with War 1, lucky with War 2, lucky with Diablo 1, lucky with Starcraft, lucky with Starcraft Brood War, lucky with Diablo 2, lucky with Diablo 2 Lord of Destruction, lucky with War 3, lucky with War 3 Frozen Throne
Plus, comparing a game that no one has seen outside of scripted E3 demos
I thought the E3 demos were playable. Visitors walked up to demo machines, Blizzard people answered questions and offered hints as the visitors played? Same with Ghost?
A game which dares to ask the question "is too much of a storyline a bad thing?"
Be STUNNED with amazement as you play a slightly different game than what other developers have in the market!
HEAR the same generic sounds, as Blizzard and competitors alike try to justify ignoring the need for sound FX staff!
SEE the beauty of jaggies and buildings you've seen a million times in Warcraft 3!
FEEL the power that comes with playing an Orc, which is only slightly different from humans!
ENJOY this great new game, one which will redefine the genre... until the next big MMOG comes out next month!
THANK Blizzard, holy be Its name, for the chance to pay $13.95 a month to play a game which will just be another level treadmill!
Look at fantasy RPGs now... Every one of them is just a slight variation of a world introduced decades ago with the original dungeons and dragons.
The worlds now, well none of them give that same special feeling as opening the Creature Compendium for the first time.
For a second there I thought they were talking about Black dwarves and (East) Indian goblins...
I've played muds as a player, coder and area maker for over 10 years, and have played almost every mainstream MMORPG on the North American market. I believe that the missing element from an RPG vs Levelling 'ad nauseum' MMORPG game, is the idea of permanent character death.
Mentioning the phrase usually incites people to reflexively assume that perm character death could NEVER work. But I don't think it has been
given serious treatment as a conceptual game element.
Consider the following.
-One of the primary appeals of an RPG game is the creation of a fictional character.
-perm character death was the norm in paper RPG games, and the appeal of the paper RPG game had a substantial impact.
-Current MMORPG's suffer from a few conceptual difficulties, inflation of levels (both of players and monsters), inflationary hording of loot, repetitive quests and events, and the big question of whether or not to allow PvP, or PK gaming.
-The inflationary aspects of current MMO's are similar to nations printing their own money.
There has to be a finite amount to give something value. The whole notion of meaning is that there is a start and end point, and the 'mean' occurs somewhere in-between. People are drawn to meaning, and character, otherwise Fantasy RPG's wouldn't exist.
It is a measure of the immaturity of the MMORPG gaming genre and/or market, that no-one has taken a serious look at the potential implications of making a game with permanent character death. (Whether fantasy/magic resurrection or appeals process is included or not)
It is a widely accepted conceit of writing drama that one of the fundamental hooks of a drama is the REAL possibility of losing a character that the reader identifies with. This element of risk makes the story INTERESTING.
MMORPG's have a somewhat different dynamic than conventional drama however, since the readers are players, and are interacting and affecting the playing experience of other players. The game designers are the storytellers from one level, but the notion of timeline that is critical to drama, is either absent, or absurdly predicably cyclical in games, hence the experience of 'camping'.
MMORPG's suffer from inconsistent levels of Role Playing given that people have different ideas of what appeals to them about the fantasy environment.
The common element that draws people to a fantasy game, is the idea of pretending to be someone else, whether thats a svelte elven princess, barbarian warrior, or effete and sinister mage.
A game designed around the concept of permanent character death, with the interest level of the game focusing on story, and character creation, rather than endless acquisitiveness could potentially turn a huge corner on MMORPG gaming history.
PvP could be allowed but would be held in check by the reality that lvl 50 PK'ers just wouldn't live to rise to that ridiculous a level, and then mindlessly take out their own personal aggressions on hapless noobs just entering the game.
PK play would be more balanced by the fact that anyone could play a PK, but would have to face the challenge of getting lynched by NPC's that treat them as outlaws or players working in a posse.
Character creation, focusing on individual uniqueness, emotes, and skills, could be the draw of the game, levelling can be part of the process. But in a perm death game, having a tavern full of 50th lvl mages, and lvl 100+ monsters hopping across the countryside wouldn't happen. A lvl 5 or 10 character would be significant. Characters could age. A real story timeline could be introduced.
Perhaps I'm being too 'literal' about the story and RPG aspects of the MMORPG genre. I believe that one of the current limits of the genre is overall motivation and age of most people drawn to fantasy. There is often a fairly prevalent adolescent notion of immortality, or lack of recognition of mortality, and the appeal of a consequence free virtual world, where one can become supremely powerful, is an essen
In the search for meaning, which includes forays into the virtual world, play itself is the most effective form of learn
I agree 100% with everything. I have never been interested in MMORPGs because of many of the problems listed here. There is not a significant amount of Role Playing going on in comparison to the power levellers. The incentive is to go out and get ph4t 1007 rather than role play.
This would raise one serious social issue however. It has already come to pass that individuals have commited suicide over what transpired in the game world. Would perma-death cause this to be more likely, since the character (and ph4t 1007) the real world person is attached to has died? Or would this make the games somewhat safer for the real world person because the character will definitely die at some point, thereby preventing too strong of a player-to-character bond?
My prediction: The world will never know. The call for perma-death will always be drowned out by cries of, "OMFG n00b I w1ll n3v3r play j00 sux0r MMORPG. I \/\/an7 ph4t 1007!"
I dunno, I think you could have some kind of 'account karma' attached to the game subscriber, so that they in each case with a new character had some random, benefit, detriment depending on the playing style of their other characters. There are various interesting possibilities for handling perm char death.
In the search for meaning, which includes forays into the virtual world, play itself is the most effective form of learn