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Dropbear posted:It's just that none of these developers seem to realize that this crowd is obviously VASTLY smaller than the theme park-MMO playerbase and aim for the stars. They need to make something more focused & smaller in scope with the expectation that IF it works (it won't with Pantheon obviously), they'll have thousands of players instead of millions & they have to keep costs low by aiming for a very specific niche. Yup, exactly. I love playing on small EQEmu servers like The Al'Kabor Project because there are about 50-75 actual players online at any given time, it's a tight knit community, you see the same faces and get to know people. A friend of mine plays some NWN persistent worlds servers for the same reason. I get the impression that Gorgon is the same way, though I didn't get into that one. They are labors of love by the developers and the communities that invest time into them. My gut feeling is that some devs might reach sustainability by somehow selling a platform that gives folks much more agency in the world and the ability to craft their own stories. i.e. somehow disentangling the engine and content delivery mechanisms from the content itself. Maybe taking a cue from something closer to Roblox than WoW, essentially selling a middleware for people to build their own not-quite-massive game.
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Nov 21, 2020 02:16
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cmdrk posted:They are labors of love by the developers and the communities that invest time into them. My gut feeling is that some devs might reach sustainability by somehow selling a platform that gives folks much more agency in the world and the ability to craft their own stories. i.e. somehow disentangling the engine and content delivery mechanisms from the content itself. Maybe taking a cue from something closer to Roblox than WoW, essentially selling a middleware for people to build their own not-quite-massive game. This has sort of happened with EQEmu conversions like Shards of Dalaya but it's so held back by a lovely old client that they have no hope of going anywhere. I'd love a more generic MMO platform for this sort of thing but I don't expect to ever see an affordable one (SpatialOS was an overpriced scam).
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Nov 21, 2020 02:36
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cmdrk posted:A friend of mine plays some NWN persistent worlds servers for the same reason. Just give us bg3 persistent worlds and we can create our own drat MMOs.
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Nov 21, 2020 06:52
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hobocrunch posted:Just give us bg3 persistent worlds and we can create our own drat MMOs. Man I'm so down for that. I haven't been following that one closely but my completely uninformed impression is that it's like... BG3: Vertical Slice of Chapter 1 of the First Shadow of Amn, playable now in Early Access!
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Nov 21, 2020 08:27
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tihs gam will b godo
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Nov 21, 2020 12:30
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Sachant posted:I'd love a more generic MMO platform for this sort of thing but I don't expect to ever see an affordable one (SpatialOS was an overpriced scam). Does BYOND still exist 
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Nov 22, 2020 13:05
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kirbysuperstar posted:Does BYOND still exist It was the right idea, at the wrong time. 
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Nov 22, 2020 18:01
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kirbysuperstar posted:Does BYOND still exist Yes, people still actively develop stuff on it too (SS13 being a well known example)
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Nov 23, 2020 01:10
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Another guy from VR passed. Kurt “Molad” Habetler, Tech Lead. RIP. https://www.dignitymemorial.com/obituaries/san-diego-ca/kurt-habetler-9913153 hobocrunch fucked around with this message at 00:30 on Nov 24, 2020 |
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Nov 23, 2020 22:22
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Oof, this game has a body count now.
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Nov 24, 2020 00:59
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That's sad. He was only 50. Wonder if the 'rona got him, or something else 
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Nov 24, 2020 06:32
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It's a shame this game is definitely vaporware although it's no surprise. Hell, it's usually a safe bet with crowdfunded games, MMOs in general, and with McQuaid dying even the hype was gone. A modern MMO in the vein of Everquest would be a ton of fun, but I'm not sure how much of a market there is for it, how much of the way it 'clicked' was a bunch of faulty parts somehow combining into something fun, and how much of the fun of old school EQ was a double-edged sword. I'd love for someone to make a MMO with the sheer number of options (and thus "unintended" ways to play) as Everquest, but I don't see it happening
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Nov 24, 2020 19:20
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dromal phrenia posted:It's a shame this game is definitely vaporware although it's no surprise. Hell, it's usually a safe bet with crowdfunded games, MMOs in general, and with McQuaid dying even the hype was gone. Given that every subsequent attempt to try to capture that lightning in a bottle has failed, it's probably partially dumb luck and partially the right combination of the right talent at the right time that made EQ take off the way it did. I'm not even sure how (un)important McQuaid was for the success/failure of any spiritual successor attempt. I think one could draw comparisons to things like the million attempts at remaking Space Station 13 that are only now starting to make small amounts of headway.
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Nov 24, 2020 22:04
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cmdrk posted:I think one could draw comparisons to things like the million attempts at remaking Space Station 13 that are only now starting to make small amounts of headway. SS13 is a good comparison. The only games that have "made it" or are at least surviving in some respect are either direct copies with engine improvements (UnityStation), or decently far removed from the inspiration (Stationeers, Barotrauma). I envision a sort of "remake valley" analogue of the uncanny valley that anything differing more than a little, but not enough, from the original falls into and dies.
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Nov 24, 2020 22:27
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isnt Among Us a streamlined SS13 clone? I havent actually played either but they sure look similar
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Nov 24, 2020 22:36
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Flavahbeast posted:isnt Among Us a streamlined SS13 clone? I havent actually played either but they sure look similar I'd say it's fair to characterize it as a simplified, streamlined version of the traitor game mode. It loses all of the depth, and all of the quirkiness, and all of the barriers to entry.
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Nov 24, 2020 23:29
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Sachant posted:I envision a sort of "remake valley" analogue of the uncanny valley that anything differing more than a little, but not enough, from the original falls into and dies. Yeah, and I'm not sure "Okay, it's EQ but it has climbing mechanics and WoW-style tabtargetting + ability mashing" is enough to climb out of the valley.
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Nov 24, 2020 23:30
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I feel like the thing I enjoy most about EQ, and something I don't expect to see replicated, is the sheer amount of options and possibilities available to you. This was especially true in p99, now that I'm older and these things are easier to research. Not only the myriad ways to play the game that are "not intended" but even just stupid things that make the game more fun. I played an enchanter this last time in EQ, and the combination of lull, mez, charm (especially), illusions, faction spells, memory blur and so forth made for such a fun time that no MMO I've played can replicate. A friend and I had a lot of fun transforming ourselves into skeletons, shrinking down, and running around screaming about skeleton science. We discovered that if I charmed an NPC, and we used a certain combination of buffs, the end result was a TINY version of that NPC. All of a sudden the bankers and shopkeeps were roughly knee-height, causing other players to shout across the zone "what the gently caress happened to Gorka the Armorer" or whatever the hell. It is entirely a stupid thing, and not at all connected to the hamster wheel of MMO grinding, but we had a blast and entertained other players with our nonsense. The ability to hand good weapons to NPCs to surprise people (hopefully to their reward), the power to go into a low-level zone and buff all the newbies, the assortment of clickies ranging from useless to overpowered, all of it made the game more fun. And that's without getting into the more common features, like the debate over whether instances are a good solution to the annoyance of camps / competitive raids, or whether they made more problems than they solved. Another story from p99, and this was clearly viewed ultimately as an exploit because the GM's changed the way the bosses actually worked to resolve it. Players did not enjoy fighting for hours through trash mobs to get to bosses, racing all the while with opposing guilds. Instead, players practiced and eventually got very good at, pulling the boss dragons to the zoneline for their guild to murder it. This involved copious use of monks and feign death, using rogues to drag necromancer pets, using call of the hero to teleport the puller a few yards away from the mob, having an enchanter with AoE mem blur as a failsafe in case you accidentally trained half the zone to the entrance, etc. It was all manipulation of aggro in the most unintended way. It was hotly debated whether this was fun or awful, but it was definitely an example of players using the game mechanics to accomplish something they weren't supposed to be able to do. Games don't have those same possibilities anymore in my experience, aside from maybe using stealth to avoid some encounters, which is far from the use of invisibility, and/or invisibility to undead, or monks pulling and feigning while you slide past or the 20 other ways to creep through EQ dungeons.
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Nov 25, 2020 00:19
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Yeah Pantheon is almost certainly going to swing the "no fun allowed" hammer pretty hard. I can't imagine them allowing nearly any of those things, nor bard swarm kiting, charming NPCs for quest turn-ins, and so on. I'd be surprised if they even allow quad kiting or some equivalent. They seem pretty dialed into the overpolished modern MMO brain worms of prescribing the only approved ways for how you should have fun in the game. Part of EQ's charm is how naïve some of the design was and how it allowed tons of unintended gameplay consequences. To their credit, for the most part they just rolled with them or soft-tuned them rather than explicitly disabling gameplay avenues. It's really quite a sandboxy game despite being a leveling PvE-focused treadmill.
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Nov 25, 2020 00:59
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Making Pantheon is like crashing your dirt bike over and over to recreate the “Mike are you over there?!?” GIF.
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Nov 25, 2020 01:04
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dromal phrenia posted:this game is definitely vaporware I don't think it is. I actually believe this game will release. Will it be good? I think it's extremely unlikely it captures the same essence people are expecting and it will come off more as boring rather than ingenious, but time will tell. I genuinely believe at this point that Brad was potentially holding them back from pushing to a final release. Maybe it's because the game wasn't EQ enough or what. The game's mechanics are mostly done bar crafting / pvp (lets be real pvp will probably be poorly implemented) and the real issue the game has left is creating it's content in the form of quests and 3d models. These quests will be hastily written and the models will get reused to a point where the overall feel of the game is just bad. Sachant posted:Yeah Pantheon is almost certainly going to swing the "no fun allowed" hammer pretty hard. I'm kind of hoping they use the stat system to really change what type of builds are viable. There could be ways to build melee wizards by stacking strength for example (Obviously you'd need some skills to support that). There's really no point of the stat system in the first place if there isn't going to be some viability to it. Also I never really understood why ARPG's get build enabling items but MMO's don't. I guess it's because there's such a huge leap in power level after obtaining these items that it's not fair to the majority of players who don't have them? hobocrunch fucked around with this message at 02:36 on Nov 25, 2020 |
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Nov 25, 2020 01:08
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Classic EQ has some build-enabling items but the way they're handled is really lovely. Things like pre-nerf Circlet of Shadow and Holgresh Elder Beads. Problem is they made them stop dropping so they created a finite and diminishing number of players who could actually do those fun things. Powerful game-affecting (defining) unobtainable items are a huge pet peeve of mine. Manastone and the like. Either nerf it for everyone or don't nerf it. Don't leave it unnerfed for whoever got there first.
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Nov 25, 2020 02:40
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hobocrunch posted:I don't think it is. I actually believe this game will release. Will it be good? I think it's extremely unlikely it captures the same essence people are expecting and it will come off more as boring rather than ingenious, but time will tell. I don’t think they even have a single zone completed.
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Nov 25, 2020 02:59
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LuckyCat posted:I don’t think they even have a single zone completed. I agree. But what I foresee happening since most of the mechanics are done is that it'll get to a point where they just need to release the game, and they'll start rushing quests, whether it's copy pasted poo poo or spelling mistakes everywhere no proof reading etc and art side of things will have the same sorta deal. I'm just saying they'll release, nothing more.
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Nov 25, 2020 04:39
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Yeah I'm pretty confident they'll release something as well. I think it will be a huge disappointment but it'll be a deliverable at the very least.
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Nov 25, 2020 04:41
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Sachant posted:Classic EQ has some build-enabling items but the way they're handled is really lovely. Things like pre-nerf Circlet of Shadow and Holgresh Elder Beads. Problem is they made them stop dropping so they created a finite and diminishing number of players who could actually do those fun things. And then you have servers like p1999 green to allow people to sit in a conga line for their manastone. it's classic
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Nov 25, 2020 05:13
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Yeah that's just a lovely consequence of how those items are. The whole reason I opted not to play on green is that I didn't want my first month or two of gameplay to be ticking off checklists of "get it before it's gone" items I had to get before I could start playing the real game. I would much sooner play on a server where they were just not made available in the first place, or never stopped dropping.
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Nov 25, 2020 05:18
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Sachant posted:Yeah I'm pretty confident they'll release something as well. I think it will be a huge disappointment but it'll be a deliverable at the very least. I cant imagine this will actually happen. That last request for funding where they explained how hosed up their development process has been sounded pretty desperate. Their options are either a rewrite, or using the current labor intensive process of zone development to complete the entire world. Either of which is going to be incredibly expensive. If they had most of the world built they might be able to limp across the finish line, but they dont even have a single zone complete.
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Nov 25, 2020 06:29
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Everquest didn't even need actual quests. They were totally optional things. Just release the game as the grindy killing mobs MMO that people want it to be, and update it later with quests.
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Nov 25, 2020 21:56
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I said come in! posted:Everquest didn't even need actual quests. They were totally optional things. Just release the game as the grindy killing mobs MMO that people want it to be, and update it later with quests. I was so bummed when I first logged into Vanguard and it defaulted to 3rd person and I saw an NPC with an exclamation point over its head.
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Nov 25, 2020 22:22
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Flavahbeast posted:isnt Among Us a streamlined SS13 clone? I havent actually played either but they sure look similar cmdrk posted:I'd say it's fair to characterize it as a simplified, streamlined version of the traitor game mode. It loses all of the depth, and all of the quirkiness, and all of the barriers to entry. I strongly disagree. Among Us is a successful translation of the Mafia/Werewolf social deduction game genre (example Werewolf ruleset here) into a computer game. In Among Us, the game phase where players are running around and doing tasks or murdering other players is nighttime in the linked ruleset, and meetings are daytime. The cool thing about Among Us is that, through tasks, they figured out how to make nighttime fun and interactive for everyone, not just the mafia/werewolves/impostors, while simultaneously giving killed players something to do. Also, "loses all the depth"? Man. Social deduction games can go very, very deep, because they're about trying to figure out who's lying (or trying to fool other players with your lies). How deep they go depends entirely on the group you're playing with, and how well they know each other. The sense in which SS13 traitor mode has depth is the infiinity of ways it offers for players to sabotage and murder, but it doesn't encourage social deduction type gameplay at all. They're very different games, is what I'm saying.
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Nov 26, 2020 07:12
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everquest is bart simpson, later MMOs are just the episode "bart gets famous"
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Nov 26, 2020 07:16
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BobHoward posted:I strongly disagree. Among Us is a successful translation of the Mafia/Werewolf social deduction game genre (example Werewolf ruleset here) into a computer game. In Among Us, the game phase where players are running around and doing tasks or murdering other players is nighttime in the linked ruleset, and meetings are daytime. The cool thing about Among Us is that, through tasks, they figured out how to make nighttime fun and interactive for everyone, not just the mafia/werewolves/impostors, while simultaneously giving killed players something to do. That's fair. I have not played any of those games you mentioned, so I only see the game through the lens of SS13. Personally I thought Among Us was boring as poo poo. Still, I did like that they made a way for dead players to still do stuff and not immediately quit to find a new server.
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Nov 26, 2020 18:06
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I'm not a fan of Mafia type games either, but something like Among Us really demands a group of people who are trying to make it work. From what I understand, the average pubbie... isn't.
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Nov 26, 2020 23:43
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Yeah, the ideal way to play social deduction games is with a group of friends who are into the concept. Which makes sense, because the genre originated that way. So, Among Us can fall flat when you join a lobby of randos, or just aren't into lying to your friends. For related reasons, Among Us works a lot better if everyone joins a discord channel and agrees to mute during nighttime rather than using the in-game text chat.
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Nov 27, 2020 00:59
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Here's some uh, concept art I guess https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NySe0jbavaM
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Dec 4, 2020 18:28
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Sachant posted:Here's some uh, concept art I guess https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NySe0jbavaM You could tell me this was a stream from 4 years ago and I would believe you.
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Dec 4, 2020 21:53
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Ehud posted:You could tell me this was a stream from 4 years ago and I would believe you. They didn't do live Q&A so maybe it is.
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Dec 4, 2020 22:37
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Sachant posted:Here's some uh, concept art I guess https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NySe0jbavaM the rat dudes that build a house on the pack animal are kinda cool. the rest are.. I dunno. why can't a bear be a bear and a deer be a deer? the alienness loses something, to me.
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Dec 5, 2020 06:27
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cmdrk posted:the rat dudes that build a house on the pack animal are kinda cool. I am fairly certain that there is "basic" versions of things, but my guess is that this is highlighting what wasn't. We've seen basic wolves in one of the gameplay streams in the starting zones right? Think a lot of that was from Faerthale. Not an awful update on it's own I think but in context it is. Stuff like this I'd normally find very interesting, it's just that considering the rest of the game, and the point in time- It's hard to get motivated.
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Dec 5, 2020 06:34
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