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Some features to think about for future sandboxes
Quirhid
Member UncommonPosts: 6,230
This will be in two parts: the first will be about making a seasonal game, or a game based on rounds, and the second will be about the extensive use of NPCs. This will be a long one...
Seasonal sandbox
The basic principle is simple: Start every season with a fresh (semi-)randomized game world see who thrives in economy, crafting, research, world domination, record and rank players at the end. End the season, and start a new one. If you have trouble imagining it, think how every new game in Civilization evolves and plays out.
What this means for exploration?
Exploration actually becomes useful. Especially in the early-to-mid game. Players have to look for adventures and places of interest. They also need to survey land/planets/asteroids in order to find resources. Perhaps this season it is you are the one who finds The Red Dragon Hoard? Or is it you who makes the first contact with the aliens? Maybe you find a good place to build a city somewhere?
Resource gathering
So because the world is randomized, you have to find your resources first. And since the game lasts for a finite amount of time, the amount of resources in the game world can also be finite. What this leads to is that people survey the land in hopes for a good sources of iron, for example, they buy the land they believe to be rich in iron, build a mine on it, and keep upgrading the mine depending on how rich the iron vein is. But when the iron runs out, they have to move elsewhere.
This means you can also fail in resource gathering if you didn't cover your losses at the end. Because the value of iron deposits varies and along with the "normal" market fluctuations, not all mines will turn profit, and not all mines are worth upgrading to the max. It pays to find a good spot and optimize your production.
Or you might want to turn to a less risky, but also a less profitable option by starting a farm or a lumber mill. Just make sure you keep planting new trees and tending your crops/herds.
Research
I have not seen any significant research mechanics in any MMORPG (no, producing blueprints doesn't count), but in strategy games where there's a definite start and an end to the game, it is often an integral part of the game. What it usually does is transform the gameplay over the course of the game. Some tactics might be useful in the early game while others work better in the late game.
For example in the context of an MMORPG, early gameplay might involve simply surviving the elements and wilderness while the late game technology could switch the focus to more abstract objectives such as maintaining your business monopoly or fighting for the dominance of the universe. The gradual increase in complexity also works as an comfortable learning curve for new players in each season.
Research might also uncover new resources to be found in the already known game world. Maybe research requires a huge investment and requires obscure materials to speed it up. All the more need to explore the game world.
Also, it might be worth noting that I am not proposing that going through all the ages and into the far futures is strictly necessary. Stone age to iron age might be enough for example.
Crafting & manufacturing
Due to more unpredictable nature of resource gathering, the market is expected fluctuate a lot more than before. Now you have to carefully calculate the cost of producing something and set a good price for it in order to make profit. That big iron mine next door is about to deplete? Hoard all the iron you can! Or perhaps you should move your smithy someplace else since the town may only exists because of the mine.
Tangible objectives for PvP
It might be as simple as territory control or as intricate as terrorism and espionage. Raid caravans to funnel trade into your city. Burn crops to raise the price of grain. Destroy manufacturing facilities to cripple enemy production. Collapse all the mithril mines to deny your opponent's access to advanced weaponry. Or maybe you'd like to rule with economic or scientific power instead?
Leaderboards and rewards
Leaderboards to track your achievements in the past seasons and rewards for the next season for those who did well. Within moderation though: We don't want to give them too much of an advantage in the next round, do we?
NPCs as the main labor force
Now as I'm imagining all this, I am also thinking there's a lot of boring stuff in the game world that players shouldn't be expected to do (like actually swinging the pickaxe for example). So I thought most of this stuff could be done by NPCs, which are to be equipped, maintained and trained (to an extent) by players. They do need to be fed, for example, they need to live somewhere, and they might not like it when you poke 'em with a sword.
So maybe they won't be crafting the best equipment out there, only the equipment other NPCs might use (pickaxes). But it becomes the players' job to manage the smithy, the mine, the farm, the caravans or the building site of a castle which a player might have designed. All the "heroic equipment" might still need player involvement as would acquiring the the "special materials" (wyvern's claws, dragon bone, Garden of Eden Creation Kits... that sort of stuff).
And why limit NPCs to doing only non-combat activities. Combat may involve leading NPC armies with players as captains of companies made up of NPCs. Granted this is much more feasible in a sci-fi setting where players could be leading spaceships filled with crews of NPCs instead (since they don't have to be shown on screen).
The point is, keeping your army supplied makes up for a nice logistical aspect for the game and also serves to curb in zerging (to an extent) since maintaining large armies can be increasingly difficult/expensive. And if you are so good as to capture the hostile NPCs, maybe you can put them into use in your army or sell them for ransom.
All in all, NPCs could work as another commodity which can be sold and bought, developed and lost (permadeath). Expert NPCs might be very valuable, and when you lose them, it will sting that much more. Since they are an exhaustible resource, perhaps some players want to make their business to deal in NPCs (without condoning slavery in real-life, obviously).
So... Thoughts? Feel free to discuss either one of the features separately or both used in the same game. I know this is all pretty high concept at this point, but going into detail would create an even longer post.
EDIT: Oh, and the answer to the question "And then what?" in a seasonal sandbox is: -"It ends. And you start over. Good luck with the next season!"
I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been -Wayne Gretzky
Comments
I really really really do not like the idea of new randomized worlds UNLESS the old ones are still around.
I look for games that have insane longevity, something I will play for years and think I am still part of the same world. There maybe parts of that world I haven't explored yet but its still the same universe.
And, to me, that's not a bad thing.
Quizzical, make it happen, sir!
There isn't a "right" or "wrong" way to play, if you want to use a screwdriver to put nails into wood, have at it, simply don't complain when the guy next to you with the hammer is doing it much better and easier. - Allein
"Graphics are often supplied by Engines that (some) MMORPG's are built in" - Spuffyre
Something like this - where there was an actual winner - is the only way I could get into a pvp game long term.
The other way would be if you had a lot of game factions - like the Elder Scrolls factions for example - and instead of having fixed faction alliances in an endless unwinnable war the game generated random wars between two or more of the neighboring factions with each border zone having its own battleground. So for example when the Nords and Dunmer were at war the players and guilds would sign up as mercenaries on one side of that war and fight in the Nord-Dunmer battleground until one side won that war (say first side to at least 10,000 points and with at least a 1000 point gap between the sides) with the players and guilds on the winning side getting a boost of some kind. Then when that war was won the game would generate another conflict.
The battle grounds would be designed as mini-campaigns that might take a week or more to win (but if close could possibly take months) so they'd be like mini versions of what the OP is talking about except players kept their characters from war to war.
I like the idea of NPCs as the main labor force. I've never loved harvesting or crafting for hours but I did it because I had to. The option to do it yourself could still be a possibility and maybe necessary earlygame.
With managing a lot of NPCs the AI would need to be far better than current gen MMOs. Many tasks that go unseen wouldn't though.
For progression you could have the option to spend your coin and skill/experience on improving your character or your NPC horde. Being an unstobable savage warrior or a legendary captain who only commands.
NPCs off at work brings up offline possibilities. You could be the manager of a construction company that runs on its own 24/7.
A game that runs in cycles has been brought up a number of times as an MMO but I don't know of any games that have it other than Don't Starve. And even in that everything doesn't reset just the rules change some. To have a real cycle of starting over an event of cataclysmic proportions would have to happen to fully or mostly reset things. Not all would have to be affected. Surviving these events could even be a pursuable goal. Starting near the end of a season could suck. Still would be interesting. In some way I think the history of all major events would need to be recorded and maybe retold through the lore.
Grepolis isn't my thing but I enjoy A Tale in the Desert.
i like the idea of a dinamically changing world, but not based in seasons, i would say to make it based in the following:
resources -> player activity -> depletion -> migration -> abandonment -> natural decay -> natural recovery/player retake -> natural elimination.
say for example:
player X found a suitable location with a huge node of iron, he gets this info to its corp and they built a mine in the place, this leads to a small center of income for them and for those that will benefit from the resource, the economy receives an input of money and resource supply due to this, but the node is not permanent, it will eventually deplete. and when there's not more to prospect there, player X's corp will probably abandon it, in search of the next place. the mine is left abandoned, eventually some parts of it will collapse and it will become like some sort of natural cave, harbouring the growth for some organisms inside, if its a fantasy setting, expect it to become overrun by kobolds, spiders or worst creatures. on the other hand it could become a bandit hideout, refitting the mine as a small base of operations in the region. once the place is left forgotten it would practically disappear from the map, and nature would take over. after some time then it would just disappear by collapsing completelly and being replaced by normal terrain.
this is the type of dinamism that should exist in a sandbox. content is randomized, it has a life on its own, as much as any NPC should.
as for NPC workforce. i know at least one game that did that in that scale, Shores of Hazeron (unavaliable at the moment, seems the developer just scrapped it finally), player run empires werent only formed by normal players, but in order to grow the empire had to built cities which were mostly inhabited by NPC citizens, citizens automated processes and were the base workforce of the city's industry and other services. with players being able to participate. citizens dictated if a city was stable or was in decay, they could help defend or serve as crew for spaceships among other stuff.