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The Future of Persistent Worlds In MMOs
Zonk did an interesting interview with Ed Stark and Dave Williams, employees for an MMO developer named Red 5 (and experienced tabletop game designers). They talk about their ideas and plans to bring about the next step in MMO gaming: increased persistence in online worlds, where an objective, once completed, stays completed. Williams said, "Right now for most of these games, when the player saves the princess and he starts walking away from the tower — if he looks back he's going to see the princess at the top of the tower again." Regarding their current work, he continues:
"If you save the village, it stays saved — you saved it! But maybe now that village becomes an objective for another player; maybe something has to be done now because that village wasn't destroyed. And so on, and so on, and so on. Building those mechanisms to make it a world that reacts to a player's actions instead of existing in a static state. That's the world we're talking about."
Join the SWAT team. You can't tell me some of the drug addicts those guys take down don't look like freaking Orcs !
Plus, the busts have no permanent effect on the world, and next week the site will spawn new orcs to be busted by another team! Just like an MMO!
How could a bard sing a song about great conquests done if everyone has done the same thing, and nothing ever changes?
One name : Lerooooooooy Jenkins
The Wise adapts himself to the world. The Fool adapts the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the Fool.