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Loot Theory In Modern Games
HDRL is running an analysis of loot systems in modern games. They talk about how in-game rewards, formerly the domain of RPGs and adventure games with powerups, have expanded to exist in every genre, as achievements and unlockable bonuses have become standard fare.
"For the majority of gamers, once the novelty is gone, they move on. To keep players interested, rewards are required. ... The Diablo series is a perfect example of the theory in effect. Just as in the story of the donkey and the carrot, a game's rewards cannot be too frequent, nor can it be too infrequent. If rewards are too frequent, they lose value in the eyes of the player, and they lose interest. If the rewards are too infrequent, the player loses sight of the carrot, and likely loses motivation to keep playing."
On Newgrounds, many of the new flash games posted there have an achievements system, it's like they have to have it these days. And that is a good thing imho, I enjoy getting these too. The game will have more play value for me due to wanting to achieve these things. It's not like we're drones made to play games right? The achievements make it fun, and that's good. Right?
In addition the Booty Theory also works, if your audience is male.
The way it works is: Add lots of hot women into your game.
You can mix the two, to get the Booty Loot Theory, in which the in-game character gets laid a lot.
I like using other peoples loot. I also like making my own loot.
Games like that are ones that allow hacking around with the game to make new mods and redesign the game.
Who here still lays Mechwarrior 3? Betcha not many. Now, how many play Total Annihilation? Knowing about the multitude of mod sites and Spring, quite a lot.
There's no unlockables in TA, other than mission mode and the tiers of technology, but that's expected in RTS'es. There's no hidden 3rd faction or hidden maps.
And trust me, loading a completely new mod on the network and playing 6 friends on a mod that we've never seen is crazy as hell in a great way.
Then the big hit of crack comes in... groups. All of a sudden things start going faster. With another person you're able to complete the quests more easily. You can tackle quests above your level with someone else that you would have had to wait to handle on your own. At that point the whole game world opens up. It isn't just about you fighting some monsters. It is all about you and whoever else you can make friends with getting things done together. Questing solo gets boring and you start looking forward to doing it with others. That becomes the biggest reward. The social dynamic enters into the game. The team work aspect enters into the game. That is the best loot of all... especially for gamers who might not have strong social lives to begin with. All of a sudden they belong and they have a purpose. I see it quite frequently in WoW. There will a young guy (usually) who will farm materials all day to make potions for the guild to use while raiding. That person will farm materials so that other guildies can make better items for themselves. That person dervives pleasure and a sense of belonging by contributing to the efforts of the guild.
I'm pretty sure this must still happen in things like wow
The problem with such stuff in WoW and such games is that the really great loot drops when you're not around. You hear about how a friend of a friend recently got [insert awesome item] and drool. Even if you didn't get that item, the fact that you're reminded that it's around, and that OTHER people are finding it keeps your hopes up. We're like rats in a big room lever pressing for snacks. Other rats getting one is a "reward" of sorts for us, and keeps us working hard in the hopes of being similarily rewarded.
Yeah, Chrono Trigger was like that too...
Actually, the loot system is simply old practices developped by casinos to keep their players gambling, but applied to video games.
Games like WoW are very similar to gambling. You invest time and money and you receive a big reward infrequently. No wonder some players get addicted...
Bleep bloop
No online graphical game has come close to UO in my opinion. No character classes, tons of items, a cool magic system with ingredients, nice summons, building ownership, good economy, scary PvP like it must have been in the medieval age...
It wasn't flawless though. The wilderness had more houses than the big cities since the developpers hadn't thought that players would have be interested in houses. Also, players were never able to create a good mercenary guild to protect the innocents so it was a world of crime. Yet, I never had so much fun with other games.
I mean, UO was a game were you could beg for a teleport stone and accept the stone from that complete stranger... only to find out it brought you to a lost rock in the middle of the sea with no way of getting back from there.
How cool is that?
:D
It's called this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operant_conditioning_chamber
That's what many of those games are :)
This is something that's been bugging me for a while, I could care less about loot. One of the things that keeps me from playing online RPGs is that the only thing they have to offer is "more loot". Warcraft players just talk about the loot they've gotten, or will get, and I'm playing Lord of the Rings Online right now and it's much more of the same.
We absolutely have to find a better reason to play than "loot". What about the joy of playing? What about the story? Are these things no longer important to us? Do we need that kind of reward to keep us in the game? I swear, games are becoming a sick reflection of our materialistic society in some ways.
That's what I hate about CoD4. When you start, not only it's hard to fight more experienced player, but on top of that they have better weapons, perks and all that. So what happens is that you're really widening the gap between experienced players, which means the "noobs" get "pwned" a lot more than they naturally should. I think that sort of system is pretty weak, and it calls for a rethinking of it.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not talking about removing that sort of promotion, or even reversing it. No, rather, I think it has to be approached differently. I won't solve the problem in 5 minutes of thinking time, but an idea could be instead of giving you an edge that makes you an even more deadly killing machine than you already were, you could gain access to new skills, no responsibilities, new capabilities that wouldn't make you more deadly a soldier but nevertheless achieve new things by gaining strategical advantages, i.e. you could gain some sort of intelligence and leadership others don't get so you could turn into a sort of leader. If you look at it, in CoD4 as you climb the rank ladder all you get is better guns and such. They could at least get some inspiration from reality, when you become a colonel in the Marines they don't reward you with an AK-47 and better ammo.
You just got troll'd!