Good, fun article & I think some of the points are very good ones that resonate with me too while others are personal nit-picks.
My wish for no species restrictions, if it is smart enough to know to wear armor & wield weapons it should be playable, goblins, orcs, kobolds, sarnak, pretty much anything that can pick up a weapon can be a player and NPCs are not termed "a goblin" in their nameplates, they have names! or no nameplate at all, the only way that you know what it is, is to study it, or fight it.
I'd hope there is no distinction between "Players" & "Monsters" there are sentients, then there are creatures, exceptions being things like dragons, or other very powerful but intelligent creatures such as Griffins.
No, or very few "static spawns" real beings & creatures move around & do things, like migrating, hunting prey or foraging for food or visiting granny...
Amazing list... But I have a feeling it's an obvious one too. Wasn't EQN scrapped because it was too much like the points on this list? They said it would have been a fine game, but it was really just another iteration of what's popular these days which I assume was EQ2 style gameplay with dynamic events and new art. I can be thankful that The Smeds didn't want that. But if it's not that, then it's exactly the opposite of this list!
I strongly agree with No Instances and No Linearity. Contested dungeons with bosses all over the place on respectable respawn timers are just... so much more fun and exciting. Camping them is like owning a piece of the land.
Originally posted by emperorwings How do you make a big world without it lagging or crashing without breaking it up in smaller areas? But it would be nice it just takes longer to load I guess. It's nice having dungeons in the open world but there just going to be people there who camp the spawn and you won't be able to complete the quest.
You instance continents. I'm not too familiar with network architecture of that scale, but I'm sure you could allocate bandwidth for a specific zone too. Maybe even have the bandwidth allocation dynamic to the amount of players in the area. I have a feeling the zoning in EQ games has to do with: EQ having a very archaic file structure and design and EQ2 was just designed the same way. EQN will most likely not be using the same design. Things have changed since 1999.
As for dungeon nameds that drop loot... just don't make a quest for them. And don't calculate named drops part of the expected gear to progress normally. If you don't NEED the gear, and you don't NEED the kill for a quest, then you don't NEED to go there. It's all about giving players something to do without having it be a mandatory thing that blocks progression.
Originally posted by emperorwings How do you make a big world without it lagging or crashing without breaking it up in smaller areas? But it would be nice it just takes longer to load I guess. It's nice having dungeons in the open world but there just going to be people there who camp the spawn and you won't be able to complete the quest.
You instance continents.
Wrong.
Darkfall and Vanguard both have massive worlds without instancing or even zoning.
PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT: LEARN THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN ZONING AND INSTANCING
Great list although id addNo Race after IksarNo mountsNo evil erudites ( they just didnt fit really)zoning i can live with - just Alchol abuse needs to come back - nekked drunk running was superb fun .Not sure about instancing - it seems to ruin most other games UNLESS you have to walk there / get a party to get there God I loved EQ1 - from beta till i decided to stop due to the dumbing down - I had an SBH early on and I was awesome as i could actually kill whisps outside BB - no xp just did it cos at last i could ... GOD I LOVED THAT GAME - up to Kunark ( minus the hole) it has never been bettered or even anything come close ..
Your in luck there won't be any Erudites at all! Because different humans and different human cultures in and mmo no longer makes sense to SOE. *rolls eyes*
Any mmo worth its salt should be like a good prostitute when it comes to its game world- One hell of a faker, and a damn good shaker!
Originally posted by Asamof Everyone ITT saying they want instancing gone are going to be crying/begging for it back when it's near impossible to get any good gear drops due to camping.
I don't know anything about how EQN's drops are going to work, but this post here just shows how trapped inside the box most players are when thinking about MMO's.
WoW basically just gave the magic item drops (in the open world) to any number of mobs. Why can't you do that with EQN? Because EQ had named mobs 14 years ago that dropped the best loot?
Why not have certain (again many different, but in different dungeons or areas) mobs drop the crafting materials required to make the best gear available to you at a certain level?
Why not walk up to a blacksmith NPC and say "I don't have much gold, but I am an tough adventurer, is there some service I can perform for you for a new sword?"
These are all game mechanics that are already in use.
We? I'm sorry but you don't represent me. While I tend to agree with some points you make, that does not mean I will stoically be a part of your general statements. You are you and I am I.
Originally posted by TheHavok We? I'm sorry but you don't represent me. While I tend to agree with some points you make, that does not mean I will stoically be a part of your general statements. You are you and I am I.
You don't know to what we he is referring to, please don't just derail the topic off splitting hairs.
Ok SBFord who are you and what have you done with the old Themepark loving SBFord? I remember your praise for SWTOR before launch. I very much disagreed with you then, but now I agree with you, Your right I dont want to see that garbage in my game. If EQ next takes the old school approach it will be around and still be P2P for many many years to come. I do not know why MMO games cater to casuals anyways, they just hop to the next MMO when the new flavor of the month releases.
Edit: By the way I can deal with zones as long as there is a feeling of some transitioning terain. AoC was abysmal in that, you would be in a swamp then zone to a freaking desert! That kills any feeling of a world, but makes you feel like your playing zones. I can deal with some instances for story missions. I however hate instancing zones and dungeons, those need to be open. A true real MMORPG has enough options of content for players to do that it does not bottleneck players into 1 area. where you are forced to instance zones. That is a hallmark of crappy themepark MMO's.
Waiting for:EQ-Next, ArcheAge (not so much anymore) Now Playing: N/A Worst MMO: FFXIV Favorite MMO: FFXI
Alchol abuse needs to come back - nekked drunk running was superb fun .
Not sure about instancing - it seems to ruin most other games UNLESS you have to walk there / get a party to get there
God I loved EQ1 - from beta till i decided to stop due to the dumbing down - I had an SBH early on and I was awesome as i could actually kill whisps outside BB - no xp just did it cos at last i could ...
GOD I LOVED THAT GAME - up to Kunark ( minus the hole) it has never been bettered or even anything come close ..
Your in luck there won't be any Erudites at all! Because different humans and different human cultures in and mmo no longer makes sense to SOE. *rolls eyes*
You would do yourself a lot of good by taking a step back off the overreaction train. They can always add Odus and the Erudites in.
Originally posted by Sithos I do NOT want to see an auction house in this game. EC tunnel was one of the absolute best places for social interaction in any game I have ever played.
Fail. Yup was lots of fun yelling for hours and hours trying to sell items. I cant think of a better use of my free time then yelling WTS. Hmmm teaming would be a better use of my time and much more social.
I agree but would like markets localized to racial kingdoms. That way there is a structure and ease of purchase but you'd still travel to see if you can find a good deal "next door".
Correct me if I am wrong but isn't the only piece of concrete information we have from SOE now that EQNext will be Free to Play? Anyone who said free to play or microtrasactions, sorry but that is the first thing they are doing.
"You CAN'T buy ships for RL money." - MaxBacon
"classification of games into MMOs is not by rational reasoning" - nariusseldon
F2P or P2P i don't care. just don't want them to church it up with another game that is so instance dominated that all you do is que in and wait. I wish above all that they bring it back to the old days. I want time limited corpse runs. I want the maps to still be player made and i love typing out text to talk to NPC's. There's nothing more id like then for them bring it back to the good old days, but i have a feeling that those days are long gone and dead. I want the difficulty back! When the original EQ started it was hard and great. I want back that since of accomplishment that SO many MMO's fail to deliver now and days. I want to camp for days and i want an open world again. Overly camped zones, and make it back to where you had to either select a class that was made for soloing, or one that made you have to group. I'm not an instance fan, unfortunately games now and days make you play the same crap over and over, and rarely give what the original EQ game did. Instances ruined what made MMO's have that feel of an actual living breathing world, and killed the immersion effect. I want to escape the real world by feeling like i am in another real world, and in the any real world there's no special instance where you get locked in and that's your special place. I 100% agree with everyone that said...
Great list. I like a good story but not libear quests. Since a good story means there is a context to the geography, a culture that is distinct, a religion or philosophy for npcs which allows for factions and allegiances, and of course politics.
I would like story that is not libear, guves context, and so when the politics of the fame change i am right in board, and want to be part of that big picture.
I know for sand box mmos, story is not a big thing, but imo, without it, the game becomes a large arena with not enough to retain play theough onve areas are conquered, compared to a large world with struggling groups of npcs and ideologies and how they are affected by player actions, and in turn affects the sand box arena. It makes things less predictable and only in the players hands to create content.
Maybe that is a unpopular idea, but a mmo with only players as content means its an uncle owen/mine craft game until there is pvp. And the pvp is brutal normally. So it becomes a simple arena and solo players wont be able to contribute if its just about zerging. Or solo pvpers will have to wait for certain events to occur to join large battles.
I haven't played an mmo that really gives a sand box all the fun for the players to create their own content, due to the fact that money is hard to come by and there are limited ways to spend that money. I think that is why sand box mmos seuggle to do well. Primarily since its a ling diwn time to get money, and after all that its linited to certain chouces. Or pvping with some conquest, but not as indepth as it should be with for example controlling areas with npc's as farmers, or wild life and seeing change in culture, new npc's, or even possibly rebellions depending.
Write bad things that are done to you in sand, but write the good things that happen to you on a piece of marble
Well I don't really care about the Fae whether in or out, at least it wasn't some space alien race or something that killed immersion.
But I will say that while zoning was annoying, especially depending on how good or bad your gaming rig was, it was the ONLY thing that saved MILLIONS of characters from untimely death by train. They were so prevalent, most of us had a hotkey for it in case we got into a bad jam..."TRAIN TO RIVERVALE FROM MISTY THICKET!!! CHOO CHOO!!!"
Well I don't really care about the Fae whether in or out, at least it wasn't some space alien race or something that killed immersion.
But I will say that while zoning was annoying, especially depending on how good or bad your gaming rig was, it was the ONLY thing that saved MILLIONS of characters from untimely death by train. They were so prevalent, most of us had a hotkey for it in case we got into a bad jam..."TRAIN TO RIVERVALE FROM MISTY THICKET!!! CHOO CHOO!!!"
hahah I forgot about the days of trains, good old days of MMO's. I still laugh at some of the trains in XI, epic times!!
Waiting for:EQ-Next, ArcheAge (not so much anymore) Now Playing: N/A Worst MMO: FFXIV Favorite MMO: FFXI
This is great! I have my doubts, because I don't want to get my hopes up, but I agree with everything you said here. Add in huge non linear, non instanced dungeons and a ton of group content to level cap...... man I gotta reign myself in here... I'm starting to get excited and I've been burnt too many times.
I agree that the world's size matters, it gives a feeling of immersion that can't be matched otherwise.
EQ1 was like that, sometimes to big too, as u could cross huge entire zones filled with mobs that nobody ever bothered attacking. But they were there, u had to cross those zones to reach certain dungeons so it still gave the feeling that the world was "living" with or without you.
Also, the hard mobs in newbie zones were fun too, i remember the first time i took down that giant it was a real achievement. Same for when they changed nektulos and made it a hard zone, and u had to hug those walls, scared, in order to make it to the next zone (till u hit the level to actually destroy the mobs inside nek).
Now, i just hope that EQN is not as grindy as EQ1, because there's no way in the world that i spend hours upon hours 3 boxing those mushrooms again to get AA. Hell, i don't even wanna hear about "one man party" anymore, i don't want to learn to play with my toes either. It was great back then but a lil bit too hardcore for these days lol.
Insider infos about the game aren't really great, unfortunately, especially the part where they redid the whole game in, like, 1 year ? But i still cross my fingers hoping it'll be a gg ! We need SOE to not fail on that one, even if it means that the game has to be pushed back by 12 months. Seriously, don't fail the community.
You're a Hardcore Survivor!
You not only survived the zombie apocalypse, but did it with style! Your mastery of zombie knowledge, survival tactics, and weaponry is nearly unmatched. Congratulations, for you are hardcore!
What's sad is that people actually believe everquest was a sandbox game. I hate to break it to you guys, but if anything everquest was the precursor to the modern themepark. It might have had some sandbox elements, but it was definitely a themepark by nature.
You are right, but when it came out in 1999, you could consider that it could have gone one of two ways? Follow-up "spiritual" successors such as WoW retrospectively defined EverQuest. In reality, the original game was a slog to the cap with much of the adventure filled in by your own imagination. To me it didn't seem like a grind only to the top and like modern theme parks. I put myself into the stories and stuff I did. So in a way, yes it was a sandbox just from its own basic design limitations.
Funny thing about "fantasy fans", we are all racist.
Yup. you hate Fae, I hate Elves.
I am not a fan of Orcs. But I still prefer them to Spaceships.
Self-pity imprisons us in the walls of our own self-absorption. The whole world shrinks down to the size of our problem, and the more we dwell on it, the smaller we are and the larger the problem seems to grow.
As EQ was my first MMO back in 1999, i have yet to have any new game come close to giving me that feeling again. We want EQ 1 with todays technology. That would wok for me. I could do without staying up for 3 days waiting for the cyclops to drop the ring for the j boots. I do not miss that nor does my wife!
"And on a side note, here's to hoping that marine bells and instant teleportation are kicked into the wings while boats make a reappearance. While the original game has infuriating wait times for traveling, it also made it feel real and immersive. Adding in teleports instantly decreases the size of the world."
If you like your immersion so much to eschew teleports I hope you'll be ok with your character being parked on a boat for two weeks IRL during the journey. Maybe they could add mini games on board, like fishing, tieing knots, sewing sails, etc. Or you could level an alt during that time.
If you don't like teleports don't use them. Go ahead, walk from one end of the island to the other, making up your own story. But don't make me waste my time with boring things like that.
Comments
Good, fun article & I think some of the points are very good ones that resonate with me too while others are personal nit-picks.
My wish for no species restrictions, if it is smart enough to know to wear armor & wield weapons it should be playable, goblins, orcs, kobolds, sarnak, pretty much anything that can pick up a weapon can be a player and NPCs are not termed "a goblin" in their nameplates, they have names! or no nameplate at all, the only way that you know what it is, is to study it, or fight it.
I'd hope there is no distinction between "Players" & "Monsters" there are sentients, then there are creatures, exceptions being things like dragons, or other very powerful but intelligent creatures such as Griffins.
No, or very few "static spawns" real beings & creatures move around & do things, like migrating, hunting prey or foraging for food or visiting granny...
You instance continents. I'm not too familiar with network architecture of that scale, but I'm sure you could allocate bandwidth for a specific zone too. Maybe even have the bandwidth allocation dynamic to the amount of players in the area. I have a feeling the zoning in EQ games has to do with: EQ having a very archaic file structure and design and EQ2 was just designed the same way. EQN will most likely not be using the same design. Things have changed since 1999.
As for dungeon nameds that drop loot... just don't make a quest for them. And don't calculate named drops part of the expected gear to progress normally. If you don't NEED the gear, and you don't NEED the kill for a quest, then you don't NEED to go there. It's all about giving players something to do without having it be a mandatory thing that blocks progression.
Wrong.
Darkfall and Vanguard both have massive worlds without instancing or even zoning.
PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT: LEARN THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN ZONING AND INSTANCING
Your in luck there won't be any Erudites at all! Because different humans and different human cultures in and mmo no longer makes sense to SOE. *rolls eyes*
Any mmo worth its salt should be like a good prostitute when it comes to its game world- One hell of a faker, and a damn good shaker!
This.
You don't know to what we he is referring to, please don't just derail the topic off splitting hairs.
Ok SBFord who are you and what have you done with the old Themepark loving SBFord? I remember your praise for SWTOR before launch. I very much disagreed with you then, but now I agree with you, Your right I dont want to see that garbage in my game. If EQ next takes the old school approach it will be around and still be P2P for many many years to come. I do not know why MMO games cater to casuals anyways, they just hop to the next MMO when the new flavor of the month releases.
Edit: By the way I can deal with zones as long as there is a feeling of some transitioning terain. AoC was abysmal in that, you would be in a swamp then zone to a freaking desert! That kills any feeling of a world, but makes you feel like your playing zones. I can deal with some instances for story missions. I however hate instancing zones and dungeons, those need to be open. A true real MMORPG has enough options of content for players to do that it does not bottleneck players into 1 area. where you are forced to instance zones. That is a hallmark of crappy themepark MMO's.
Waiting for:EQ-Next, ArcheAge (not so much anymore)
Now Playing: N/A
Worst MMO: FFXIV
Favorite MMO: FFXI
You would do yourself a lot of good by taking a step back off the overreaction train. They can always add Odus and the Erudites in.
have a nice day
I agree but would like markets localized to racial kingdoms. That way there is a structure and ease of purchase but you'd still travel to see if you can find a good deal "next door".
"classification of games into MMOs is not by rational reasoning" - nariusseldon
Love Minecraft. And check out my Youtube channel OhCanadaGamer
Try a MUD today at http://www.mudconnect.com/My number one thing I wouldn't want in EQN is SOE...I just know they're going to ruin it, just like they do every game they've ever touched.
Some of their games were good to start out, then SOE ruined them. Most of their games were bad from the start, and never got any development (VG!)
F2P or P2P i don't care. just don't want them to church it up with another game that is so instance dominated that all you do is que in and wait. I wish above all that they bring it back to the old days. I want time limited corpse runs. I want the maps to still be player made and i love typing out text to talk to NPC's. There's nothing more id like then for them bring it back to the good old days, but i have a feeling that those days are long gone and dead. I want the difficulty back! When the original EQ started it was hard and great. I want back that since of accomplishment that SO many MMO's fail to deliver now and days. I want to camp for days and i want an open world again. Overly camped zones, and make it back to where you had to either select a class that was made for soloing, or one that made you have to group. I'm not an instance fan, unfortunately games now and days make you play the same crap over and over, and rarely give what the original EQ game did. Instances ruined what made MMO's have that feel of an actual living breathing world, and killed the immersion effect. I want to escape the real world by feeling like i am in another real world, and in the any real world there's no special instance where you get locked in and that's your special place. I 100% agree with everyone that said...
SOE don't F*CK this up.
I would like story that is not libear, guves context, and so when the politics of the fame change i am right in board, and want to be part of that big picture.
I know for sand box mmos, story is not a big thing, but imo, without it, the game becomes a large arena with not enough to retain play theough onve areas are conquered, compared to a large world with struggling groups of npcs and ideologies and how they are affected by player actions, and in turn affects the sand box arena. It makes things less predictable and only in the players hands to create content.
Maybe that is a unpopular idea, but a mmo with only players as content means its an uncle owen/mine craft game until there is pvp. And the pvp is brutal normally. So it becomes a simple arena and solo players wont be able to contribute if its just about zerging. Or solo pvpers will have to wait for certain events to occur to join large battles.
I haven't played an mmo that really gives a sand box all the fun for the players to create their own content, due to the fact that money is hard to come by and there are limited ways to spend that money. I think that is why sand box mmos seuggle to do well. Primarily since its a ling diwn time to get money, and after all that its linited to certain chouces. Or pvping with some conquest, but not as indepth as it should be with for example controlling areas with npc's as farmers, or wild life and seeing change in culture, new npc's, or even possibly rebellions depending.
Write bad things that are done to you in sand, but write the good things that happen to you on a piece of marble
Completely agree!!!
Well I don't really care about the Fae whether in or out, at least it wasn't some space alien race or something that killed immersion.
But I will say that while zoning was annoying, especially depending on how good or bad your gaming rig was, it was the ONLY thing that saved MILLIONS of characters from untimely death by train. They were so prevalent, most of us had a hotkey for it in case we got into a bad jam..."TRAIN TO RIVERVALE FROM MISTY THICKET!!! CHOO CHOO!!!"
hahah I forgot about the days of trains, good old days of MMO's. I still laugh at some of the trains in XI, epic times!!
Waiting for:EQ-Next, ArcheAge (not so much anymore)
Now Playing: N/A
Worst MMO: FFXIV
Favorite MMO: FFXI
I agree that the world's size matters, it gives a feeling of immersion that can't be matched otherwise.
EQ1 was like that, sometimes to big too, as u could cross huge entire zones filled with mobs that nobody ever bothered attacking. But they were there, u had to cross those zones to reach certain dungeons so it still gave the feeling that the world was "living" with or without you.
Also, the hard mobs in newbie zones were fun too, i remember the first time i took down that giant it was a real achievement. Same for when they changed nektulos and made it a hard zone, and u had to hug those walls, scared, in order to make it to the next zone (till u hit the level to actually destroy the mobs inside nek).
Now, i just hope that EQN is not as grindy as EQ1, because there's no way in the world that i spend hours upon hours 3 boxing those mushrooms again to get AA. Hell, i don't even wanna hear about "one man party" anymore, i don't want to learn to play with my toes either. It was great back then but a lil bit too hardcore for these days lol.
Insider infos about the game aren't really great, unfortunately, especially the part where they redid the whole game in, like, 1 year ? But i still cross my fingers hoping it'll be a gg ! We need SOE to not fail on that one, even if it means that the game has to be pushed back by 12 months. Seriously, don't fail the community.
You're a Hardcore Survivor!
You not only survived the zombie apocalypse, but did it with style! Your mastery of zombie knowledge, survival tactics, and weaponry is nearly unmatched. Congratulations, for you are hardcore!
Self-pity imprisons us in the walls of our own self-absorption. The whole world shrinks down to the size of our problem, and the more we dwell on it, the smaller we are and the larger the problem seems to grow.
You nailed it Adam!
As EQ was my first MMO back in 1999, i have yet to have any new game come close to giving me that feeling again. We want EQ 1 with todays technology. That would wok for me. I could do without staying up for 3 days waiting for the cyclops to drop the ring for the j boots. I do not miss that nor does my wife!
"And on a side note, here's to hoping that marine bells and instant teleportation are kicked into the wings while boats make a reappearance. While the original game has infuriating wait times for traveling, it also made it feel real and immersive. Adding in teleports instantly decreases the size of the world."
If you like your immersion so much to eschew teleports I hope you'll be ok with your character being parked on a boat for two weeks IRL during the journey. Maybe they could add mini games on board, like fishing, tieing knots, sewing sails, etc. Or you could level an alt during that time.
If you don't like teleports don't use them. Go ahead, walk from one end of the island to the other, making up your own story. But don't make me waste my time with boring things like that.