It's too bad that the 'art' of writing is really sliced, diced, and chopped into a format that is 'system' friendly. I mean, it sounds as if the feeling is really sucked out and watered down so that the 'gamer' can digest it.
I think the issue is that most gamers don't want to think... unless it's to find a way to level quickest. While a lot of people will take find that phrase offensive or abrasive, it's still truth. Like the OP said, people just wanna hit level cap and move on to 'the real game'.
Anyway, it really sounds like the creative hand-cuffs are applied to people with genuine artistic ability.
Personally, I like "Kill 10 rats" quests, but I don't need them to be complicated. This type of kill/collect/return quest works perfectly well as a bounty task and seldom needs any fleshing out. I'm more than happy with lots of guards/oficials/obsessives placed all around the world, who want ears and tails and paws and rocks and leaves brought to them for a small reward.
I honestly don't need a lot of detail. It's a mechanism to add structure to what would otherwise be aimless random slaughter of wildlife. I know what it's for as a player and my character knows what it's for in context. FedEx quests, which I love, are even more straightforward.
This might make you assume I woudln't be the kind of person to bother reading quest text, but in fact I read virtually all of it, in every game I play. Moreover, badly written (or even worse, badly translated) quest text is enough, in and of itself, to stop me playing a game. I don't read badly-written prose in other media and I won't put up with it in games, either.
I thought Warhammer had the ideal solution - full, coherent dialog for all quests, but with a short one or two line summary of the actual requirements of the quest in bold font at the end. I would suggest designers could even go one step further and have a toggle in the UI for "Full" or "Short" dialog.
If the Bioware MMO doesn't have some very high quality quest dialog, however, there is going to be hell to pay!
Yeah but Lotro is full of kill 10 X get 10 X Take X to X where X will give you a quest to kill 10 X - Some of the early quests involved running back and forth between hobbits over and over and over.. Funcom made a point of trying to remove a lot of 'rat' quests and making it much more entertaining with voice acting.. its just a terrible shame that after the 1st 20 levels the voice acting all but stopped. Perhaps they should forget about story and have KILL 10 RATS! pop up in big red letters with some exciting music.. trying to make story out of that is just silly.
Actually, they patch in a lot more voice acting after Tortage even if its just 10% of the game it is there. But AoC do have some really good quests like the one where you interview 3 suspects to find who is a thief. It ain't epic but you really have to think there to find the culprit.
On the other hand have AoC still a lot of quite boring quests, the fact that you can talk back makes it interesting but your answers rarely matters.
AoC have it's good points about quests but it is too little, if your answers mattered and if they gave you more different option depending on who you was maybe. But Im sure Bioware will do that, to bad they are doing Star wars and not Forgotten realms.
SanyaDirector of Community Undead LabsMemberUncommonPosts: 50
Holy guacamole, I didn't expect so many comments!
In no particular order:
- Yes, I think Turbine "gets it" in a way few other studios do, but LOTRO as a license helps a lot. I don't mind running back and forth within one single town when the story is exciting - like the two hobbits in love quest one of you mentioned - but I mind a lot when I'm supposed to run from one end of the map to the other for a stupid non-story related reason. There's a dev in every studio that gets off on doing that. I don't know why.
- I didn't mind kill ten rats in EQ because that was my first MMO. I tried AC, couldn't get past the art style. That was part of my problem in WOW, too. I'm not a big graphics snob, but I do have major aesthetic preferences.
- Y'all saying that MMO studios are willfully interpreting the data so they can save money and use any old warm body as a quest writer aren't entirely wrong. But you are missing one basic thing - the metrics prove people are skipping the text, period. Not skipping the text if it's not well written, not skipping some and not others, not reading some lengths and not others. Customers are slapping the "gimme quest" button within two seconds. They are not reading the text, no matter what it says. If writers bury key clues in the text, the only result is a bunch of customer service tickets from people who can't solve the quest because they didn't read the text.
I suspect this is less true in LOTRO because if you're into LOTRO, you're into the lore, as some of you have pointed out.
- I haven't tried DDO since the third week it was out. It launched without dungeons or dragons, so I was not really into it. I meant to give it another shot ever since I heard about the massive improvements, and just haven't had the time.
Sanya M. Weathers Director of Community Undead Labs
but then the industry introduced metrics... ... and intentionally misinterpreted the results. "introduced" is the correct term. Maybe "imposed" would have been even better. Like statistics, metrics can be twisted to give any result you want.
And what companies want is to "streamline" (ie chop) the dev process down to the point where it doesn't cost anything to produce. Deep immersive linked story arcs are antithetical to that streamlinig .
99% of MMOs suck in this area, not because that's what players want, but because that's what companies tell us we want.
Metrics are a Marketing tool. Metrics don't follow, they lead.
As an entertainment marketer (you may all boo now...) I have to come in defense of parts of this. One part is the "companies" -- perhaps you should say, "the accountants" or "the investors." If game companies could make games that make no money but were awesomely entertaining to a small niche, I think many people in the game industry would *love* to do that.
But take SOE as an example -- they had what was a niche game, skill based (which is rare), SF base (which was rarer at the time), and with an AWESOME IP (Star Wars).
So, did SWG jump, or was it pushed?
We don't know what the internal conversation was that led to the nerfing of SWG.
Perhaps Lucasfilms, who licensed the IP to them, was threatening to do what it did last year, and license the IP to another MMO company because they weren't seeing enough revenue from a niche game. (Has anyone bothered to count the years between SWG's inception and SWTOR's license? I bet that's the duration of Sony's exclusive rights in their IP contract....)
We don't know if someone up the then-more-tiers of management between SOE and Sony-the-borg-top-level hit the panic button because SWG's subscriber base wasn't growing fast enough, or their profit margin was bad because they'd spent too much dev time on an awesome housing system, or what.
Or, it could have been SWG's own crew in Austin. But personally, I kind of doubt that.
The game companies, ultimately, are not there to make great games. They are there to make games that make profits. It's just like the movie industry. Make a suck movie, and you'll probably still get financing to try for another hit. Make a suck sequel (or expansion, or nerf) to a hit, and it'll still probably make enough money.
Until the players figure out a way to create the equivalent of HBO, we're doomed.
HBO came onto cable when cable didn't *have* premium services. Cable was about $20/mo most places. HBO was more than the base cable charge on a monthly basis. So you had to more than double your cable bill to get it. Wisdom on the street: No one would pay. There were plenty of movies on TV, already.
Many years later, HBO is not only one of the strongest cable networks, but it's budded off Cinemax, and has a whole constellation of competitors.
So, if you want *GREAT* storytelling -- are you willing to pay for it? Are there 200,000-500,000 gamers willing to pay $150 pre-order for a kickass game and $50/mo after the first three months? Because, ultimately, that's what it's going to take to get the game you want.
Assuming you can all agree on what great storytelling is, and don't get pissed off the first time something isn't to you taste and cancel your sub.
Now, given that, do you understand why companies -- who must make money on these things -- are (a) risk averse; and (b) don't believe the market is there for people like me and you?
It sucks. But it will take something like an HBO-level transformative risk that *makes it* to change what we get fed to us.
The gaming companies tell us what "we" want, because statistically, that *is* what we want. Just like the movies that were already on TV was all that the stats showed that people wanted on TV before HBO.
Yrs,
Shava
/*who is looking for a marketing or writing or PR job in gaming atm in Boston, pls PM me! */
having interesting quests would definitely be nice, however my priority list looks something like this:
1. Server stability
2. Combat
3. Economy
4. PVP content / Endgame
5. Interesting quests
My guess is that devs have very similar priority lists and that is why we get kill 10 rats quests. I personaly dont care what kind of quests we get as long as first 4 points are done properly.
There will NEVER be in-game balance unless there is only one type of character combat skill per 'WORLD'.
Sword and Shield.
Dual Wield.
Pet Master.
Caster.
Whatever.
Quests are a necessary distraction for Noobs who need to learn combat skills. They should be optional.
Once you eliminate character imbalance (mezz, stun, pets, special weapons, shield bash, glowy swords) used in varying balance, you get balance.
Just make the PVP abilities equally achievable in each world.
If I am going to spec Magician, then that world has magic and anything goes BUT all I fight PVP are magicians who can have the same powers.
If I want to be a Stealth Warrior, then that is the way of my world - watch out! (or is that try to watch out???).
There has NEVER been a game with balance - in truth, the Human side of DAOC would have ALL been Smite Clerics within a year of game inception had Mythic not screwed that up.
I tend to agree with the people who are not interested in being told a story or playing through storyline quests. The only story I am interested in when I play a game is the story of my character in that world.
I liked that EQ was originally 'NeverQuest' -- there were quests, but that wasn't the biggest part of gameplay. You did them for faction, items or later, for zone access, but they weren't a major component of getting experience or even gear. Newer stuff (Secrets of Faydwer in particular) has had more quest-oriented content, but it's still mostly stuff you can either do while in a regular exp group or can do quickly before getting down to the business of pursuing your other goals of the day, in my experience. You may have chosen to play differently, which is my point-- it's all choice.
I might have been killing 10 rats, but unless I was desperate for faction or the trinket from that, I could skip it. Those little quests were mostly a waste of my playtime in terms of achievement. I might have spent forever getting a key to Veeshan's Peak (I hate you, "pained soul"! I hate you forever!) or to Vex Thal, but once you do that, you don't have to do it again for that character, and even having done it was a mark of achievement in itself when that content was current. (Nowadays, most old keyed zones are open to everyoneof appropriate level anyway.)
When I played WoW, it became really clear, really quickly, that quests were the most efficient way to progress. I felt like I was on a mandatory quest conveyor belt that took me from one set of quests to another as I levelled up. I hated it. Grinding away at quests is not necessarily better than a straight up kill-for-exp grind, and can be worse if you're not getting together with other people and being social over it.
EQ2 had it's share of typical quests, and then some other ones that really got me interested in the story related to the quests, which is really something, since I'm not usually into any of that stuff. On the other hand, as with WoW, I felt like a slave to my quest log.
Do we need better quests or just more interesting worlds to play in? Depends on your play style. If you're a gamer interested in the game (as separate from roleplaying or the virtual world), better quests might make you happy. If you're just interested in racking up levels, gear, and other marks of achievement, you might go either way. If you're interested in suspending disbelief and having the freedom to set your own goals and write your own story, then maybe better quests are the least of your worries.
... This is where I draw the line: __________________.
I don't really have anything insightful that hasn't been said already. The rats were just too cute to not comment on though hehe.
Those rats are us, the player base.
The developer drops a piece of cheese somewhere within the maze of the game, then watches as we madly scramble around trying to quickly get to the piece of cheese.
Then we start complaining because, as we get close to the piece of cheese, they haven't put in any more walls to the maze.
We feel cheated because the piece of cheese is left out in the open, with no more "content" around it.
But we still feel "uber leet" because we got there fast.
Then we move on to the next game to do it all over again......
What Happened With SWG Went Down YEARS AGO! Please Try To Stop Whining About It In Every Thread I Read. Mourn It, And Finally MOVE ON With Your Lives! Thanks A Heap.
I appreciate when the writers interject some humor into the writing. It helps to make those basic newbie quests more fun.
After you've played a few mmo's, the quest system begins to feel like a treadmill. Quests are task oriented. Do this. Do that. Not everyone in the game is on the same page so atleast for me I end up running around on my own, especially where chain quests are involved. And then when I do get in a group, everyone is somehow a speed reader. I can read 80 pages an hour in real life when reading novels, but people I end up grouping with have can glance at a few paragraphs in 2 or 3 seconds and be done. It makes me feel rushed, and I don't like to be rushed. I'm trying to relax and have a good time...
I wish they would just let us enjoy the game by letting us be self directed, doing what we want to do. That is true freedom. Instead of having to do quests to get nice items, there should be a chance that those items or similar will drop from mobs. A good chance not a rare one.
I think the most fun I had in an MMORPG was Ragnarok Online when it first came out in the Beta. Why? There was so much interraction between players and the GMs. We didn't get free items or anything of the sort, but you would be able to walk through the main towns and SEE GMs sitting around talking to people. And if they got bored, well hopefully you weren't a merchant advertising your wares, because hell would break lose as they would summon TONs of bosses into the towns. It was so much entertainment, even as a low level, to fight these big bosses that the whole town would have to fight to take down.
I haven't really had any gaming experiences similar to that, ever. I understand GMs not wanting to be around their players in some settings.. but never? Seems a little cold shoulder to me.
I appreciate when the writers interject some humor into the writing. It helps to make those basic newbie quests more fun.
After you've played a few mmo's, the quest system begins to feel like a treadmill. Quests are task oriented. Do this. Do that. Not everyone in the game is on the same page so atleast for me I end up running around on my own, especially where chain quests are involved. And then when I do get in a group, everyone is somehow a speed reader. I can read 80 pages an hour in real life when reading novels, but people I end up grouping with have can glance at a few paragraphs in 2 or 3 seconds and be done. It makes me feel rushed, and I don't like to be rushed. I'm trying to relax and have a good time...
I wish they would just let us enjoy the game by letting us be self directed, doing what we want to do. That is true freedom. Instead of having to do quests to get nice items, there should be a chance that those items or similar will drop from mobs. A good chance not a rare one.
This is one of the main reasons why I solo in every mmo I play. If the team skips the quest text, then I have to if I wanna keep up. Then, if it's a quest I haven't done before, I wont have any clue what's going on. That lessens my fun.
What Happened With SWG Went Down YEARS AGO! Please Try To Stop Whining About It In Every Thread I Read. Mourn It, And Finally MOVE ON With Your Lives! Thanks A Heap.
I liked this one a lot. Mainly cause it's something I've always been curious about. I mean, kill 10 rats was fun when EQ did it. *pats Scruffy* But seeing another kill 10 rats quest these days is probably what makes myself, and a lot of people, skip quest text in general. MMO: "Kill 10 rats." Me: "Ah, so that's your delivery? Cool. I'll stop paying attention." [insert quest text skipping and powerleveling mentality... right about now]
You bring up a good point. I found myself doing this exact thing in LoTRO, and I hadn't thought about my behavior until I read your post. What I have done routinely, now that I think about it, is skip to the bottom of the dialogue to glance at the requirements. When I see that it's another "kill 10 boars" I completely ignore the paragraphs of text and dash off.
A darn good point there DefB. My feeling is, "Why should I waste my time reading all of that?" Not because I don't like story - quite the opposite! - but because it's just another brain dead counting game. If they took the time to make the mechanics interesting then I would definitely take the time to read the dialogue.
As far as skipping text is concerned, there's also the issue of paragraphs of text on a quest NPC in the middle of a dungeon. If you're with a group then it's not like you can expect the group to wait for you to read the dialogue, ya know?
I liked this one a lot. Mainly cause it's something I've always been curious about. I mean, kill 10 rats was fun when EQ did it. *pats Scruffy* But seeing another kill 10 rats quest these days is probably what makes myself, and a lot of people, skip quest text in general. MMO: "Kill 10 rats." Me: "Ah, so that's your delivery? Cool. I'll stop paying attention." [insert quest text skipping and powerleveling mentality... right about now]
You bring up a good point. I found myself doing this exact thing in LoTRO, and I hadn't thought about my behavior until I read your post. What I have done routinely, now that I think about it, is skip to the bottom of the dialogue to glance at the requirements. When I see that it's another "kill 10 boars" I completely ignore the paragraphs of text and dash off.
A darn good point there DefB. My feeling is, "Why should I waste my time reading all of that?" Not because I don't like story - quite the opposite! - but because it's just another brain dead counting game. If they took the time to make the mechanics interesting then I would definitely take the time to read the dialogue.
As far as skipping text is concerned, there's also the issue of paragraphs of text on a quest NPC in the middle of a dungeon. If you're with a group then it's not like you can expect the group to wait for you to read the dialogue, ya know?
That's why I solo.
What Happened With SWG Went Down YEARS AGO! Please Try To Stop Whining About It In Every Thread I Read. Mourn It, And Finally MOVE ON With Your Lives! Thanks A Heap.
Yet another "it's the players fault" so-called article by what's-her-name.
-Letting Derek Smart work on your game is like letting Osama bin Laden work in the White House. Something will burn.- -And on the 8th day, man created God.-
Imagine a game where your actions effect the outcome. If you do not know what to do during a mission you might kill 10 rats and get ingredients to cook them...... and get a minor reward for doing so. But maybe what the person really wanted was for you to kill 10 guild rats ( slang for childeren in street gangs ). Obviously both would be correct..... right?
Star Wars: The Old Republic,. If it is anything like the KOTOR series RPG games, You better bealive skipping walls of text and just clicking to reward will cost you :-p.
Originally posted by Mysk As far as skipping text is concerned, there's also the issue of paragraphs of text on a quest NPC in the middle of a dungeon. If you're with a group then it's not like you can expect the group to wait for you to read the dialogue, ya know?
This is exactly why I thought DDO would be so good, and why it was so disappointing to me. I thought we would end up with groups who, as though we were running on a tabletop, would be interested in story and framing for each scenario. Instead, the instances became speed challenges...
Originally posted by Mysk As far as skipping text is concerned, there's also the issue of paragraphs of text on a quest NPC in the middle of a dungeon. If you're with a group then it's not like you can expect the group to wait for you to read the dialogue, ya know?
This is exactly why I thought DDO would be so good, and why it was so disappointing to me. I thought we would end up with groups who, as though we were running on a tabletop, would be interested in story and framing for each scenario. Instead, the instances became speed challenges...
*sigh*
Shava
Yeah, "speed challenges" are fine once in a while if it's something for the story. [Pull the 3 levers within 20 minutes or the dam will flood.] But it's not okay for every adventure. That "Timed Mission" stuff should really only be in racing games, in my opinion.
What Happened With SWG Went Down YEARS AGO! Please Try To Stop Whining About It In Every Thread I Read. Mourn It, And Finally MOVE ON With Your Lives! Thanks A Heap.
Quest grind, kill this kill that, weapons grind, spells grind.... Whether its level base or not you will always have grind, just different forms.
What bothers me most about quest grind is that my choice of quest tends to have no particular relation to my character's goals. I tend not to be making interesting decisions, just riding the rails.
I've played with many instant gratification people in the past. You know the type...you're on an interesting quest line and want to read the text...they click accept and run off, or start the next part before you've had a chance to read the first 2 words of the quest.
Quest window vanishes, give heavy sigh, realize that mmos are dieing a painful death because the stories and roleplaying is vanishing.
This is why I rarely group anymore. Other players often detract from my immersion when trying to quest and appreciate those quests that ARE interesting. I know, it makes no sense...play an mmo but play solo lots of time. But this is the pidgeon hole that communities and writers are forcing lots of player in to.
Great article. It clarifies the frustration that a new writer for an MMO project must feel. I tend to think MMOs decline quickly these days for lack of passion - the new writer's passion is strangled as their creativity is funneled into the same pattern of writing that is born from what the statistics tell us and is used by every other MMO out there. No wonder we keep getting the same games over and over.
Comments
Great write up. Really great stuff.
It's too bad that the 'art' of writing is really sliced, diced, and chopped into a format that is 'system' friendly. I mean, it sounds as if the feeling is really sucked out and watered down so that the 'gamer' can digest it.
I think the issue is that most gamers don't want to think... unless it's to find a way to level quickest. While a lot of people will take find that phrase offensive or abrasive, it's still truth. Like the OP said, people just wanna hit level cap and move on to 'the real game'.
Anyway, it really sounds like the creative hand-cuffs are applied to people with genuine artistic ability.
Another topnotch article.
Personally, I like "Kill 10 rats" quests, but I don't need them to be complicated. This type of kill/collect/return quest works perfectly well as a bounty task and seldom needs any fleshing out. I'm more than happy with lots of guards/oficials/obsessives placed all around the world, who want ears and tails and paws and rocks and leaves brought to them for a small reward.
I honestly don't need a lot of detail. It's a mechanism to add structure to what would otherwise be aimless random slaughter of wildlife. I know what it's for as a player and my character knows what it's for in context. FedEx quests, which I love, are even more straightforward.
This might make you assume I woudln't be the kind of person to bother reading quest text, but in fact I read virtually all of it, in every game I play. Moreover, badly written (or even worse, badly translated) quest text is enough, in and of itself, to stop me playing a game. I don't read badly-written prose in other media and I won't put up with it in games, either.
I thought Warhammer had the ideal solution - full, coherent dialog for all quests, but with a short one or two line summary of the actual requirements of the quest in bold font at the end. I would suggest designers could even go one step further and have a toggle in the UI for "Full" or "Short" dialog.
If the Bioware MMO doesn't have some very high quality quest dialog, however, there is going to be hell to pay!
Well, it better be really epic then because running is boring... And if I get bored it is not epic.
Well, it better be really epic then because running is boring... And if I get bored it is not epic.
Well said, Loke.
Actually, they patch in a lot more voice acting after Tortage even if its just 10% of the game it is there. But AoC do have some really good quests like the one where you interview 3 suspects to find who is a thief. It ain't epic but you really have to think there to find the culprit.
On the other hand have AoC still a lot of quite boring quests, the fact that you can talk back makes it interesting but your answers rarely matters.
AoC have it's good points about quests but it is too little, if your answers mattered and if they gave you more different option depending on who you was maybe. But Im sure Bioware will do that, to bad they are doing Star wars and not Forgotten realms.
Holy guacamole, I didn't expect so many comments!
In no particular order:
- Yes, I think Turbine "gets it" in a way few other studios do, but LOTRO as a license helps a lot. I don't mind running back and forth within one single town when the story is exciting - like the two hobbits in love quest one of you mentioned - but I mind a lot when I'm supposed to run from one end of the map to the other for a stupid non-story related reason. There's a dev in every studio that gets off on doing that. I don't know why.
- I didn't mind kill ten rats in EQ because that was my first MMO. I tried AC, couldn't get past the art style. That was part of my problem in WOW, too. I'm not a big graphics snob, but I do have major aesthetic preferences.
- Speaking of Kill Ten Rats... I just want to pimp these guys: http://www.killtenrats.com/
- Y'all saying that MMO studios are willfully interpreting the data so they can save money and use any old warm body as a quest writer aren't entirely wrong. But you are missing one basic thing - the metrics prove people are skipping the text, period. Not skipping the text if it's not well written, not skipping some and not others, not reading some lengths and not others. Customers are slapping the "gimme quest" button within two seconds. They are not reading the text, no matter what it says. If writers bury key clues in the text, the only result is a bunch of customer service tickets from people who can't solve the quest because they didn't read the text.
I suspect this is less true in LOTRO because if you're into LOTRO, you're into the lore, as some of you have pointed out.
- I haven't tried DDO since the third week it was out. It launched without dungeons or dragons, so I was not really into it. I meant to give it another shot ever since I heard about the massive improvements, and just haven't had the time.
Sanya M. Weathers
Director of Community
Undead Labs
As an entertainment marketer (you may all boo now...) I have to come in defense of parts of this. One part is the "companies" -- perhaps you should say, "the accountants" or "the investors." If game companies could make games that make no money but were awesomely entertaining to a small niche, I think many people in the game industry would *love* to do that.
But take SOE as an example -- they had what was a niche game, skill based (which is rare), SF base (which was rarer at the time), and with an AWESOME IP (Star Wars).
So, did SWG jump, or was it pushed?
We don't know what the internal conversation was that led to the nerfing of SWG.
Perhaps Lucasfilms, who licensed the IP to them, was threatening to do what it did last year, and license the IP to another MMO company because they weren't seeing enough revenue from a niche game. (Has anyone bothered to count the years between SWG's inception and SWTOR's license? I bet that's the duration of Sony's exclusive rights in their IP contract....)
We don't know if someone up the then-more-tiers of management between SOE and Sony-the-borg-top-level hit the panic button because SWG's subscriber base wasn't growing fast enough, or their profit margin was bad because they'd spent too much dev time on an awesome housing system, or what.
Or, it could have been SWG's own crew in Austin. But personally, I kind of doubt that.
The game companies, ultimately, are not there to make great games. They are there to make games that make profits. It's just like the movie industry. Make a suck movie, and you'll probably still get financing to try for another hit. Make a suck sequel (or expansion, or nerf) to a hit, and it'll still probably make enough money.
Until the players figure out a way to create the equivalent of HBO, we're doomed.
HBO came onto cable when cable didn't *have* premium services. Cable was about $20/mo most places. HBO was more than the base cable charge on a monthly basis. So you had to more than double your cable bill to get it. Wisdom on the street: No one would pay. There were plenty of movies on TV, already.
Many years later, HBO is not only one of the strongest cable networks, but it's budded off Cinemax, and has a whole constellation of competitors.
So, if you want *GREAT* storytelling -- are you willing to pay for it? Are there 200,000-500,000 gamers willing to pay $150 pre-order for a kickass game and $50/mo after the first three months? Because, ultimately, that's what it's going to take to get the game you want.
Assuming you can all agree on what great storytelling is, and don't get pissed off the first time something isn't to you taste and cancel your sub.
Now, given that, do you understand why companies -- who must make money on these things -- are (a) risk averse; and (b) don't believe the market is there for people like me and you?
It sucks. But it will take something like an HBO-level transformative risk that *makes it* to change what we get fed to us.
The gaming companies tell us what "we" want, because statistically, that *is* what we want. Just like the movies that were already on TV was all that the stats showed that people wanted on TV before HBO.
Yrs,
Shava
/*who is looking for a marketing or writing or PR job in gaming atm in Boston, pls PM me! */
having interesting quests would definitely be nice, however my priority list looks something like this:
1. Server stability
2. Combat
3. Economy
4. PVP content / Endgame
5. Interesting quests
My guess is that devs have very similar priority lists and that is why we get kill 10 rats quests. I personaly dont care what kind of quests we get as long as first 4 points are done properly.
There will NEVER be in-game balance unless there is only one type of character combat skill per 'WORLD'.
Sword and Shield.
Dual Wield.
Pet Master.
Caster.
Whatever.
Quests are a necessary distraction for Noobs who need to learn combat skills. They should be optional.
Once you eliminate character imbalance (mezz, stun, pets, special weapons, shield bash, glowy swords) used in varying balance, you get balance.
Just make the PVP abilities equally achievable in each world.
If I am going to spec Magician, then that world has magic and anything goes BUT all I fight PVP are magicians who can have the same powers.
If I want to be a Stealth Warrior, then that is the way of my world - watch out! (or is that try to watch out???).
There has NEVER been a game with balance - in truth, the Human side of DAOC would have ALL been Smite Clerics within a year of game inception had Mythic not screwed that up.
For Calararon - a GOOD cleric. (and not me)
Long Live OOTBW!!!!!
I tend to agree with the people who are not interested in being told a story or playing through storyline quests. The only story I am interested in when I play a game is the story of my character in that world.
I liked that EQ was originally 'NeverQuest' -- there were quests, but that wasn't the biggest part of gameplay. You did them for faction, items or later, for zone access, but they weren't a major component of getting experience or even gear. Newer stuff (Secrets of Faydwer in particular) has had more quest-oriented content, but it's still mostly stuff you can either do while in a regular exp group or can do quickly before getting down to the business of pursuing your other goals of the day, in my experience. You may have chosen to play differently, which is my point-- it's all choice.
I might have been killing 10 rats, but unless I was desperate for faction or the trinket from that, I could skip it. Those little quests were mostly a waste of my playtime in terms of achievement. I might have spent forever getting a key to Veeshan's Peak (I hate you, "pained soul"! I hate you forever!) or to Vex Thal, but once you do that, you don't have to do it again for that character, and even having done it was a mark of achievement in itself when that content was current. (Nowadays, most old keyed zones are open to everyoneof appropriate level anyway.)
When I played WoW, it became really clear, really quickly, that quests were the most efficient way to progress. I felt like I was on a mandatory quest conveyor belt that took me from one set of quests to another as I levelled up. I hated it. Grinding away at quests is not necessarily better than a straight up kill-for-exp grind, and can be worse if you're not getting together with other people and being social over it.
EQ2 had it's share of typical quests, and then some other ones that really got me interested in the story related to the quests, which is really something, since I'm not usually into any of that stuff. On the other hand, as with WoW, I felt like a slave to my quest log.
Do we need better quests or just more interesting worlds to play in? Depends on your play style. If you're a gamer interested in the game (as separate from roleplaying or the virtual world), better quests might make you happy. If you're just interested in racking up levels, gear, and other marks of achievement, you might go either way. If you're interested in suspending disbelief and having the freedom to set your own goals and write your own story, then maybe better quests are the least of your worries.
...
This is where I draw the line: __________________.
Those rats are us, the player base.
The developer drops a piece of cheese somewhere within the maze of the game, then watches as we madly scramble around trying to quickly get to the piece of cheese.
Then we start complaining because, as we get close to the piece of cheese, they haven't put in any more walls to the maze.
We feel cheated because the piece of cheese is left out in the open, with no more "content" around it.
But we still feel "uber leet" because we got there fast.
Then we move on to the next game to do it all over again......
What Happened With SWG Went Down YEARS AGO! Please Try To Stop Whining About It In Every Thread I Read. Mourn It, And Finally MOVE ON With Your Lives! Thanks A Heap.
This is why I play games that don't make Quests a main focus in character advancement.
Why would I want to run quests if all of them have two line descriptions and basically make me to the same shit over and over?
Give me my freedom let me make my own content and leave those lame quests in as an optional way to make cash.
If you want to keep quests feeling like Jobs then stop making them the focus of a game!
Playing: EvE, Ryzom
I appreciate when the writers interject some humor into the writing. It helps to make those basic newbie quests more fun.
After you've played a few mmo's, the quest system begins to feel like a treadmill. Quests are task oriented. Do this. Do that. Not everyone in the game is on the same page so atleast for me I end up running around on my own, especially where chain quests are involved. And then when I do get in a group, everyone is somehow a speed reader. I can read 80 pages an hour in real life when reading novels, but people I end up grouping with have can glance at a few paragraphs in 2 or 3 seconds and be done. It makes me feel rushed, and I don't like to be rushed. I'm trying to relax and have a good time...
I wish they would just let us enjoy the game by letting us be self directed, doing what we want to do. That is true freedom. Instead of having to do quests to get nice items, there should be a chance that those items or similar will drop from mobs. A good chance not a rare one.
I think the most fun I had in an MMORPG was Ragnarok Online when it first came out in the Beta. Why? There was so much interraction between players and the GMs. We didn't get free items or anything of the sort, but you would be able to walk through the main towns and SEE GMs sitting around talking to people. And if they got bored, well hopefully you weren't a merchant advertising your wares, because hell would break lose as they would summon TONs of bosses into the towns. It was so much entertainment, even as a low level, to fight these big bosses that the whole town would have to fight to take down.
I haven't really had any gaming experiences similar to that, ever. I understand GMs not wanting to be around their players in some settings.. but never? Seems a little cold shoulder to me.
This is one of the main reasons why I solo in every mmo I play. If the team skips the quest text, then I have to if I wanna keep up. Then, if it's a quest I haven't done before, I wont have any clue what's going on. That lessens my fun.
What Happened With SWG Went Down YEARS AGO! Please Try To Stop Whining About It In Every Thread I Read. Mourn It, And Finally MOVE ON With Your Lives! Thanks A Heap.
You bring up a good point. I found myself doing this exact thing in LoTRO, and I hadn't thought about my behavior until I read your post. What I have done routinely, now that I think about it, is skip to the bottom of the dialogue to glance at the requirements. When I see that it's another "kill 10 boars" I completely ignore the paragraphs of text and dash off.
A darn good point there DefB. My feeling is, "Why should I waste my time reading all of that?" Not because I don't like story - quite the opposite! - but because it's just another brain dead counting game. If they took the time to make the mechanics interesting then I would definitely take the time to read the dialogue.
As far as skipping text is concerned, there's also the issue of paragraphs of text on a quest NPC in the middle of a dungeon. If you're with a group then it's not like you can expect the group to wait for you to read the dialogue, ya know?
You bring up a good point. I found myself doing this exact thing in LoTRO, and I hadn't thought about my behavior until I read your post. What I have done routinely, now that I think about it, is skip to the bottom of the dialogue to glance at the requirements. When I see that it's another "kill 10 boars" I completely ignore the paragraphs of text and dash off.
A darn good point there DefB. My feeling is, "Why should I waste my time reading all of that?" Not because I don't like story - quite the opposite! - but because it's just another brain dead counting game. If they took the time to make the mechanics interesting then I would definitely take the time to read the dialogue.
As far as skipping text is concerned, there's also the issue of paragraphs of text on a quest NPC in the middle of a dungeon. If you're with a group then it's not like you can expect the group to wait for you to read the dialogue, ya know?
That's why I solo.
What Happened With SWG Went Down YEARS AGO! Please Try To Stop Whining About It In Every Thread I Read. Mourn It, And Finally MOVE ON With Your Lives! Thanks A Heap.
I love quests why is this artilcle being soo rude about quest
Yet another "it's the players fault" so-called article by what's-her-name.
-Letting Derek Smart work on your game is like letting Osama bin Laden work in the White House. Something will burn.-
-And on the 8th day, man created God.-
Imagine a game where your actions effect the outcome. If you do not know what to do during a mission you might kill 10 rats and get ingredients to cook them...... and get a minor reward for doing so. But maybe what the person really wanted was for you to kill 10 guild rats ( slang for childeren in street gangs ). Obviously both would be correct..... right?
Star Wars: The Old Republic,. If it is anything like the KOTOR series RPG games, You better bealive skipping walls of text and just clicking to reward will cost you :-p.
This is exactly why I thought DDO would be so good, and why it was so disappointing to me. I thought we would end up with groups who, as though we were running on a tabletop, would be interested in story and framing for each scenario. Instead, the instances became speed challenges...
*sigh*
Shava
This is exactly why I thought DDO would be so good, and why it was so disappointing to me. I thought we would end up with groups who, as though we were running on a tabletop, would be interested in story and framing for each scenario. Instead, the instances became speed challenges...
*sigh*
Shava
Yeah, "speed challenges" are fine once in a while if it's something for the story. [Pull the 3 levers within 20 minutes or the dam will flood.] But it's not okay for every adventure. That "Timed Mission" stuff should really only be in racing games, in my opinion.
What Happened With SWG Went Down YEARS AGO! Please Try To Stop Whining About It In Every Thread I Read. Mourn It, And Finally MOVE ON With Your Lives! Thanks A Heap.
What bothers me most about quest grind is that my choice of quest tends to have no particular relation to my character's goals. I tend not to be making interesting decisions, just riding the rails.
I've played with many instant gratification people in the past. You know the type...you're on an interesting quest line and want to read the text...they click accept and run off, or start the next part before you've had a chance to read the first 2 words of the quest.
Quest window vanishes, give heavy sigh, realize that mmos are dieing a painful death because the stories and roleplaying is vanishing.
This is why I rarely group anymore. Other players often detract from my immersion when trying to quest and appreciate those quests that ARE interesting. I know, it makes no sense...play an mmo but play solo lots of time. But this is the pidgeon hole that communities and writers are forcing lots of player in to.
Meh.
Great article. It clarifies the frustration that a new writer for an MMO project must feel. I tend to think MMOs decline quickly these days for lack of passion - the new writer's passion is strangled as their creativity is funneled into the same pattern of writing that is born from what the statistics tell us and is used by every other MMO out there. No wonder we keep getting the same games over and over.