Do players want this style mmo but with different developers?

filmoret

We hear a lot of people crying for sandbox mmo's.  How they are going to save the genre and complex crafting systems.  This game has exactly those elements yet seems to be failing miserably.  Extremely complex crafting and sandbox out of the yingyang.  You can just start building a town anywhere so long as you can stop other players from trying to kill you during the process.

Is it the pvp element that causes sandbox players to just say bleh?  Do people just hate this develpoer?  I can't figure out why everyone is looking for some kind of sandbox/crafting savior mmo and completely ignore this title.  This game should be a sandbox players dream come true.

Kyleran

The reason for this title's lack of success, underfunding and low production values (at least at launch) are right up at the top of the list from what I've read.

SEANMCAD

filmoret said:

We hear a lot of people crying for sandbox mmo's.  How they are going to save the genre and complex crafting systems.  This game has exactly those elements yet seems to be failing miserably.  Extremely complex crafting and sandbox out of the yingyang.  You can just start building a town anywhere so long as you can stop other players from trying to kill you during the process.

Is it the pvp element that causes sandbox players to just say bleh?  Do people just hate this develpoer?  I can't figure out why everyone is looking for some kind of sandbox/crafting savior mmo and completely ignore this title.  This game should be a sandbox players dream come true.

the games that 'fail miserably' are the ones that slap FFA PVP on top of the entire world.

People didnt leave Darkfall because you can make boats
People didnt leave Darkfall because of enchanting
People didnt leave Darkfall because of seige crafting
People didnt leave Darkfall because they can have a house miles away from anyone

people left Darkfall because of the FFA PVP and exploits that allowed cheating.

Suggesting otherwise is really bordering on just being exploitative for an agenda to be distruptive and dishonest. (in my view)

Talonsin

There was a pretty big sized community around this game when it launched that was perfectly fine with the pvp element.  That being said, no pvp-focused mmo will ever be as big as a non-pvp focused mmo.  This was apparent to the people behind UO and the basis of them adding the trammel maps.

MO is a terrible game as far mechanics are concerned.  Hitboxes - I can be right on you and miss and you can be 20 feet away from me and hit me.  In a PvP game this is just terrible.

Their is little testing done on new patches.  Their testing group is like 10 players.  This is why their patches are so bug ridden.

Their GMs are terrible.  I have never witnessed a game with such a corrupt group of GM's.  Telling friends where a lone crafter might be so they can gank him while he is collecting resources.  GM's spawning rare resources for their friends and GM's protecting their friends/guilds, even during sieges. 

This game has been out for years and mentioned on just about every gaming website.  They provide a free trial of their game and they are on steam and yet STILL have less that 3000 subscriptions from around the planet to their product.   I'm not making that up, that number comes from their financials.  It isnt the genre the game is in, its the game and the terrible developers.

Gdemami

People like the idea of sandbox(whatever that is supposed to be) but things rarely work how you imagine them.

It also applies to devs, not just players.

Maquiame

I want ArcheAge alpha done by a western developer.

Phry

Do people want a sandbox Fantasy MMO, yes, do they want one thats also FFA PVP, not so much.
The problem as always is that too many people think that a Sandbox game has to have PVP of some kind, and its usually the worst kind which is OW FFA PVP, without restrictions and some heavy penalties for doing so, its a bit of a no brainer, its going to be unpopular.
Even BDO had to incorporate a Karma system to curb the excesses of the gankers, you don't lose xp in pvp as long as you have positive Karma, but if you have negative Karma you lose xp, and if you attack someone not flagged for PVP, then, boom, you just lost Karma, the PVE player loses nothing, and carries on, the PVP player however, if they are into negative Karma, has a problem, if they die, they will lose XP, and there is of course the other problems associated with negative Karma, and thats the guards, they will totally kill you if they see you, so, forget going to visit a bank or a vendor anytime soon, and if thats not bad enough, if your in negative Karma, you can't go afk anywhere because you can be attacked by other players no matter where you are, and they don't even have to flag for PVP to do it, oops.

CrazKanuk

It's got like 250k players all-time on steam (500k owners total). Only 4k active in the last 2 weeks though. 

Could be production values, could be gameplay. Could be that people really don't want that style of game. I point, again, at SWGEmu. I mean it's not even illegal anymore and yet....... dead. 

Vrika

filmoret said:

I can't figure out why everyone is looking for some kind of sandbox/crafting savior mmo and completely ignore this title.  This game should be a sandbox players dream come true.

People are ignoring MO because it's a terrible game. Too many bugs, and too bad execution. It's so bad that it doesn't matter what features the game has, it would fail anyway.

Sovrath

filmoret said:

We hear a lot of people crying for sandbox mmo's.  How they are going to save the genre and complex crafting systems.  This game has exactly those elements yet seems to be failing miserably.  Extremely complex crafting and sandbox out of the yingyang.  You can just start building a town anywhere so long as you can stop other players from trying to kill you during the process.

Is it the pvp element that causes sandbox players to just say bleh?  Do people just hate this develpoer?  I can't figure out why everyone is looking for some kind of sandbox/crafting savior mmo and completely ignore this title.  This game should be a sandbox players dream come true.

The game is god awful that's why. I seem to remember downloading it only to uninstall within 10 minutes. Though to be fair, that was a while ago, maybe it's amazing now? I sort of doubt it.

Also, not everyone who wants a fantasy sandbox wants to pvp even though there are people who insist that the only way you can have a sandbox is with pvp (rolls eyes at that).

I believe this was the game that had an update and a huge chunk of land went missing and players were floating and falling when they entered the area.

The game felt junky.

Fdzzaigl

Sovrath said:

<snip>
The game feel junky.

Not just feels, it really is junk. Though I guess I'm being unfair as I saw it only in a "beta" state. But given the fact that it released only weeks later with the same problems I'm not really feeling bad about it.

I think the developers chewed off much more than they could handle with this game. But as for the question in the OP: no, because not only is there no need to have PvP in every sandbox, making a PvP sandbox with whack-a-mole clusterfuck combat (though some insist on it being super complex) is a sure road to certain doom.

Though I'll grant the game that it amused me because of its junkiness. It's the only time I remember being killed by a pink flying (untextured) ferret who then appeared to nibble on my desynced character's exposed penis.

Octagon7711

Games like these sounds good on paper but seldom become popular when the dream meets the reality.

Shaigh

Plenty of gankboxes are popular on steam, add mmorpg style progression and they aren't as popular.

YoungCaesar

They did fix desync except for the ocasional lag and fired all the player GMs (now they are paid). The game is in a decent state, but they blew their chance at steam release, their servers couldnt handle the load and it was impossible to get in. 

filmoret

I find it completely unfair how players judge this game based on its beta performance.  That was like 7 years ago.

LIOKI

I logged in the other day just to have a look. I had 3 characters back at release, but there was only one available slot when I fired the game back up. I decided to start fresh and deleted the character in the slot, made a new one, then when it switched back to character select one of my other older characters was in the slot. I had to repeat the process 3 times in order to clear out my old characters and make a new one. With that out of the way I dove right in..

There is a small tutorial area now that's better than the old one, and most of the players I ran into did not kill me, the majority of them weren't naked, or pick pocket me yay \o/
It's still a slow, hard to get started in game with dated graphics and clunky combat. I still might put some hours in, but the idea of getting killed and losing everything isn't as appealing as it first seemed.

Talonsin

filmoret said:

I find it completely unfair how players judge this game based on its beta performance.  That was like 7 years ago.

You realize the steam release was not long ago so those players judged it on its current condition.  It went from thousands of players online to less than 300 using steam.  Its great that you found a game you like and are so forgiving of the issues it has had but sadly most of us are of a different opinion.

filmoret

Talonsin said:

filmoret said:

I find it completely unfair how players judge this game based on its beta performance.  That was like 7 years ago.

You realize the steam release was not long ago so those players judged it on its current condition.  It went from thousands of players online to less than 300 using steam.  Its great that you found a game you like and are so forgiving of the issues it has had but sadly most of us are of a different opinion.

I would agree if like 90% of the things people complain about don't even exist in the game any more.

SpottyGekko

filmoret said:

We hear a lot of people crying for sandbox mmo's.  How they are going to save the genre and complex crafting systems.  This game has exactly those elements yet seems to be failing miserably.  Extremely complex crafting and sandbox out of the yingyang.  You can just start building a town anywhere so long as you can stop other players from trying to kill you during the process.

Is it the pvp element that causes sandbox players to just say bleh?  Do people just hate this develpoer?  I can't figure out why everyone is looking for some kind of sandbox/crafting savior mmo and completely ignore this title.  This game should be a sandbox players dream come true.

If you had been around for the launch of this game, you'd understand. If you'd followed the game for a year or two after release, you'd understand even more.

Some players are impatient and leave quickly. Others are more tolerant and take much longer to reach the point of quitting. But neither of those groups are likely to ever return in significant numbers.

The list of features is not the deciding factor in the success of a game. The implementation of those features is what makes or breaks it.

AshestoAshes420

I played MO for 6 months, looked past the bugs and found fun times with friends. They never fixed the bugs and even new ones emerged...so i left.

I played darkfall for 2 years and had alot of fun. Sure you could exploit mobs to gain skill and there were hacks that allowed you to see through walls and fly all over the world, but the game itself was clean when it came to the pvp. 

I dont like greifing people but im the kinda person that likes the added risk vs reward of losing all my stuff on death. This obviously isnt the gaming experience most people look for and as such these kinda games get a bad rap.

Gloria Victis has a nice open loot system where you are given a certain amount of looting points. So if i have really good gear the person that killed me will only beable to loot one or two peices of gear while if my gear is no good they will beable to loot up to 4 peices of loot.

It seems like games with open loot get alot of hate because there are people that dont play smart and lose more than they produce and that builds alot of frustration. I see people talking very poorly about games like these except its hard for me to relate because i had an awesome experience while my time on them.

Squishydew

I'd definitely give it a go if it had a better developer, MO and Darkfall where complete trash to me, character control and combat just felt dreadful.

That said, i really only played fairly early iterations of both.

Mardukk

Squishydew said:

I'd definitely give it a go if it had a better developer, MO and Darkfall where complete trash to me, character control and combat just felt dreadful.

That said, i really only played fairly early iterations of both.

Interesting because many feel that Darkfall had the best combat in the genre.  I agree with you on MO's combat though.

I would definitely like to see someone, with more than two developers, make a game like Mortal.

filmoret

Mardukk said:

Squishydew said:

I'd definitely give it a go if it had a better developer, MO and Darkfall where complete trash to me, character control and combat just felt dreadful.

That said, i really only played fairly early iterations of both.

Interesting because many feel that Darkfall had the best combat in the genre.  I agree with you on MO's combat though.

I would definitely like to see someone, with more than two developers, make a game like Mortal.

Yea MO's pvp combat is top notch.  You have directional blocking, riposte, dodging.   It requires fast reflexes and lot of skill.

QuarterStack

The ideas behind open world PvP, even with full loot, are feasible. 

The thing that many people don't seem to understand is that there's a difference between delivering on a concept, and doing a *good job* with it. 

I've had a craving for lasagna lately. So, if someone hands me a plate of lasagna, that doesn't automatically mean "well, I got what I was craving, so all is good". The lasagna could suck. It could be poorly seasoned, the pasta could be under/over cooked, the cheese could be bad, etc. My craving for a plate of lasagna will not have been satisfied, despite having been given a plate of it.

Same thing here, the problem is not that the idea is bad - there is a demographic who enjoy that kind of experience. The problem is that the games are poorly designed/executed.

For me, no one has done the open world PvP with loot thing better than Lineage 2 in its heyday (pre GoD, between Chronicle 1 and Interlude, in particular). Notwithstanding the botting problems, the PvP and PvE in that game was well intertwined and balanced, as each supported the other. The looting, at first, was pretty harsh, as you could drop entire armor pieces upon death. Over time, I think they realized that, with how difficult it was to obtain higher grade gear, people were less willing to take the risk of losing it. So, they adjusted the rules for dropping gear to only happening if someone went Red/Chaotic with 5 or more PK's on them. This made people more willing to go out and PvP (or even PvE) without fear of losing their gear, but kept the risk in being a career criminal type.

In a nutshell, it's not enough to simply have an open world PvP MMO. It has to be a well-designed and executed open world PvP MMO.

And by many accounts, there are people who love MO's combat; it's exactly what they enjoy. For a lot of people, Darkfall's gameplay is exactly what they enjoy, despite the criticism from others. So, who is anyone else to tell them they're wrong?

Distopia

QuarterStack said:

In a nutshell, it's not enough to simply have an open world PvP MMO. It has to be a well-designed and executed open world PvP MMO.

The biggest detrimental factor to that IMO has been designing a PVP game how you would design a PVE MMORPG. Huge giant worlds where you spread the action too thin, huge power gaps between new and old players (which hurts overall growth in the long run).. Too much emphasis on gear, mob grinding, etc... 

My ideal approach to a PVP MMORPG would be one in which the first thing you do is join a guild or faction and are already effective to fight, your skill set just expands as you gain knowledge (XP)...  Design the world specifically for PVP, don't waste time on a huge environment that most of will never be used. Make a tight system of battle that ebbs and flows with the players actions. Crafting would solely be used to create dwellings, fortifications, gear, and siege equipment. NPC's tied to keeps (think AOE) would gather resources, whoever was winning has the most NPCS... Creating a reason to create alliances and conquer. 

SEANMCAD

Distopia said:

QuarterStack said:

In a nutshell, it's not enough to simply have an open world PvP MMO. It has to be a well-designed and executed open world PvP MMO.

The biggest detrimental factor to that IMO has been designing a PVP game how you would design a PVE MMORPG. ...

maybe I dont understand.
PVE Open Sandbox multiplayer games exist and are doing rather well. There are fewer at the scale of 'Massive' but the rule sets could easily apply.

Its like someone is talking about the lack of existence of the very games I play.....a little hard to digest.