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Only Sandbox Games Should Be Called Next-Gen MMOs!
MARTYB2K
Member Posts: 167
Games like Age Of Conan are a step back in my opinion. Who the hell wants to got back to instances, and zones after playing seemless games like Star Wars Galaxies, and to a lesser extent even WOW. Also too many games are classed as MMOs these days.
So in summary, a 5 year old sandbox game like SWG is much more next-gen than a linear roleplaying game like AOC. So devs cut the "next gen" statement crap, unless your game is at least zoneless, and partly a sandbox.
Comments
Oh noes...
Imbecille!!!
You and everyone else know that NEXT GEN = GFX!!!
If it aint top notch GFX, it's not next gen!!
Gameplay upgrades or world upgrades or rethinking how MMO's work will nevar be NEXT GEN!
Now get on the level/quest mill and run like every other hampster!
"Sandbox" is more like "Retro Gaming" actually...
Or whatever it is you crazies THINK sandbox means in your little heads that we used to have but don't anymore...
- CaesarsGhost
Lead Gameplay and Gameworld Designer for a yet unnamed MMO Title.
"When people tell me designing a game is easy, I try to get them to design a board game. Most people don't last 5 minutes, the rest rarely last more then a day. The final few realize it's neither fun nor easy."
I think that a Sandbox is a meter and a half by meter and a half square filled with sand, and lined with wood that may or may not be painted a dark shade of red. Inside of this Sandbox, beside the sand, there would be a few small Tonka trucks and/or Hot Wheels, and also a rubber ducky that was lobbed through a near-by bathroom window. The sandbox would be fully interactive, with the sand deformable, the trucks movable unless they get clogged with sand, and the ducky... well, the ducky would just kinda sit there.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Playing: Nothing
Played: Champions Online, CoX, STO, PSO, WoW, lots of free-to-play crap
Looking Forward To: DC Universe Online, Blade and Soul
Personally, I feel we won't have a truly 'NEXT GEN' mmorpg until BioWare decides to show off whatever they're cooking up. I think there are already a lot of misconceptions about their game and people think they're making a WoW clone which is pretty ridiculous given the company's track record for innovation.
But I guess I could be wrong... time will tell.
EARTHRISE, Fallen Earth, TCoS and MORTAL ONLINE look pretty interesting and possibly will evlovle the genre further.
BOYCOTTING EA / ORIGIN going forward.
Uh calling Sandbox games "Next Gen" is kind of backwards you know..I mean they've been around since Ultima Online..there's nothing new about them...there's just been very few to succeed or last long term (the latter only applies to swg..it'd of lasted and fairly succeed if not for incompetent interference).
Please Refer to Doom Cat with all conspiracies & evil corporation complaints. He'll give you the simple explination of..WE"RE ALL DOOMED!
"Sandbox" games suck... true story.
"Sandbox" is often just shorthand for "lack of content".
But hey all you diehard sandbox fans, why aren't you playing Second Life?
Secondlifes own user metrics... for the past 6 months (and much much longer) 30% of clients leaving the world have been due to something crashing. Even someone who is capable of tweaking their system to the fullest to work around every issue/bug/whatever will still end up having a couple crash to desktops a month though it's typically a shorter period than that.
As for a sandbox MMO I refuse to wait for a AAA sandbox. We aren't going to get one in any reasonable amount of time. If you want to play a AA/ex-AA MMO that's a sandbox enjoy EvE other than that you're better off just enjoying the new and interesting stuff that's comming in the next year or so.
I find it amazing that by 2020 first world countries will be competing to get immigrants.
Yea, EVE is the one good example we have right now. Unfortunately though, the setting keeps a lot of us from playing it. But, once you get an EVE-like MMO in a more traditional "ground based" setting...
Because yes, played EVE, thought it was a GREAT game, but it just didnt... "gave me" anything back.
Place the same gameplay on a over-used (
) fantasy setting, and bang! Winner!
Or not... it might just suck like so many other games
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Senhores da Guerra
You have Wurmonline. very indy worth looking at what a 'traditional' EvE would start out as.
I find it amazing that by 2020 first world countries will be competing to get immigrants.
Time to go check it out again. If it's the one i think it is, i hated the way you would control your char.
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Senhores da Guerra
I disagree that games need to be sandbox to be next gen. Sandbox has been around for a good long time now, so there's nothing 'next' about it. Age of conan I have to say is very much 'next gen' because it's vastly different from the preceeding batch of games, weather you like it or not, it is a part of the 'next generation'.
It's fair enough that you only like sandbox games, there's nothing wrong with that. Personally I usually agree, with Age of Conan standing out as a brilliant exception, but that has nothing to do with weather it's next gen or not, it's next gen because it came out in the next group of games to hit the market. EQ2 and WoW and Eve and Lineage 2 were all once 'next generation' despite only one of them being a sandbox game. The classification tends to be based more around the system requirements and the time at which the game releases than anything else.
If the same were to be said of people, then you could say "I don't think kids should be called 'next generation' unless they employ some of the ideas of previous generations" Sandbox is a very old concept now, there's no way it could be said to be a defining feature of next generation games.
So exactly what is it that makes sandbox next gen? Or are you just defining things the way that you like to fit your argument? Sound like it to me, there is nothing next gen about SWG or UO, good games yes, next gen no.....
I agree with the OP in the sense that a "true next-gen" MMORPG needs to be BASED on the sandbox model.
The problem is that sandbox games pretty much stopped evolving with this retro linear, essentially single-player RPG online thing that we were forced to endure for the past 4+ years.
We cannot know what a "next-gen" MMORPG will look like simply because nothing like it has been done yet.
However it will have to be built on a "sandbox" paradigm. Why? Because it is inherent to the "online world" medium - it emphasises the defining features of that medium - multiuser, interactive, persistent. This is an axiom in all creative mediums - a work that makes the best use of the most unique features of a given medium will be the most successful. Facebook and Myspace are built on this sandbox paradigm, for example.
Sandbox = dynamic shared world that can be changed through user action.
However, this does not preclude any kind of dev-made content. Quite the opposite - I'll say that a true next-gen game will have a dynamic world that can be changed through player action but which is filed with dev-made content that is triggered by players.
Imo we need some kind of a new word for this new type of game. I'd call it a "playground" MMO. Instead of a sandbox where you have nothing but sand to build your own castles of, a playground is stuffed with all kinds of neat toys that you can play with and even build castles out of if you wish.
An example of a "playground" game would be GTA4 in multiplayer mode. Although players have tremendous freedom to do what they want their environment is influenced by high level AIs that dynamically interact between themselves and players. It is a "sandbox" in the sense that you can carve out your own place and influence the environment but there is huge amount of content (like quests etc) that is produced by the game itself dynamically.
There is nothing next gen about sandbox games, there have been sandbox mmorpg's for almost a decade if not longer.
A sandbox has nothing to do with what makes a game next gen or not.
I think it has everything to do with whether its next-gen or not.
Imo a next-gen game will combine "sandbox " underlying world structure with "theme ride" dev-made content into one seamless whole.
Both pure sandbox and pure theme ride concepts are old-gen. Next-gen is going to be a successful fusion of the two.
Next-gen is meaningless semantics.
The true measure of any game released is the fun factor. Anything else is either part of marketing hype or forum arguments.
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Leemeg.
Lol... The Title "Next-Gen" is just a mark how games getting even worser than the last...
One of the first ones was the best: "Ultima Online"! Handling, Interface, Pvp, (your choice)...
Since then more and more good ideas went to the trashcan and im just afraid of whats gonna be "next-garbage"...
The only difference u can make, is calling a game an "MMO" which can be even Tennis or Golf-Online or you call it an "mmoRPG" which offers you a chance to not just play, but live your life. Even WOW (what i actuallyplay!) is not a mmoRPG but just an MMO... you just login and play the way Blizzards wants you to and log out again
Lol, that might be so, but there are trends and there are distinguishing features in games, just like in any form of entertainment.
It is quite obvious that today the genre of MMORPGs is stagnating. There is bound to be some kind of a seismic change within the genre which will revitalize it.
You might say that its all semantics but film-noir, underground and french new wave film movements were all quite real, with very real effect on both artistic perception of film and the film industry's profits. Imo if such a conceptual change happens in MMORPGs we'll have to give it a name and "next-gen" is as good as any.
You just said that sandbox is a 5 year old concept. Why would it be "next-gen"?
Sandbox is obviously not NEW and not popular. Why classify a OLD and unpopular concept as next gen?
If you want to cling to the past, that is your choice, but to try to revive an old concept by calling it next-gen is a bit silly.
Plus, seamless transition != sandbox. Those are two very different concepts.
All games out now are single player games. Why?
Because you dont need no one but the npc's .
Player Ran, Player Made games have tons of stuff you have to do.
With games today all you need to do is hit mobs in the head and then run around after a few hours gone by.
And say iam bored!
With a game that you have to live in and fight for a liveing you will never get bored.
Thousands of skill , to make everyone different.
100 skill trades or less will give everyone something different to do.
Only able to master one skill will be fun.
Because if everyone can master every skill then your going back to single player game. Why?
Because you will not need no one but your self to get what you need!
WWIIOnline The Real War!
Eh, I always found seemless worlds to be annoying when it comes to killing specific mobs. Who in their right mind wants to compete with five other groups to tag one mob that spawns every 15 minutes? I think instancing is the best solution, as long as it is not overly used. For example, I like killing my quest boss mobs in instances, but thoroughly enjoy grinding mobs in the open wilderness, where boss mobs can randomly spawn.