It doesn't matter how many players per server you have, what matters is how you organize relationships. Facebook has a billion+ users who could, at any moment, choose to be fiends, but that doesn't mean they are all reading each others' walls.
A game like EvE has a single large server where local communities form based on geography. Other games use guilds to let people make subcultures. I think there's a lot of room to explore here ... although I don't have many ideas personally.
I'm really not sure how to respond to this comment. I don't see how Facebook has anything to do with gameplay in an MMOs. Those billions of users are not standing next to each other killing the same mobs in endless swarms. Relevance?
I'm glad you mention Eve, had you read this discussion you find that I claim that Eve does massive very well. It has a HUGE galaxy with thousands of stars to explore and a concurrent actual user base in the 20000s. That's great, but because of its huge size and the design of the stations it doesn't feel crowded.
When I say games shouldn't be "Massive" I'm talking about this insistence on current games to open up servers and dungeon finders to tens of thousands of players that immediately begin ignoring each other beyond Chuck Norris jokes in regional chats.
Originally posted by Scot Nice one OP. We live in an age of midget MMO's and you want to know if they are too massive. Maybe in some, but count your lucky stars we have MMO's like that left. The plethora of F2P midget MMO's has taken over the genre, if you were looking at this from the outside that's what a MMO would seem like to you. Small, ribbon like worlds connecting little hubs.
F2P MMOs are nothing but crass cash grabs targeting low information players; sucking cash from idiots in the same way Casinos farm bored old people and welfare recipients.
I'm talking about the direction of AAA and pay to buy or subscribe large scale MMOs, such as GW2 and FF14 etc.
These games open their world to tens of thousands of people in areas that are very crowded and don't feel wild or dangerous like many MMOs used to feel before there was 10k people on every damn server.
I'm looking for Online RPG with hundreds with room to feel like you are exploring and helping overcome challenges. Right now I just don't see that in these games AT ALL. Just looking to see if there is similar sentiment out there. Evidently everyone likes Halo style multiplayer in the MMOs..my bad...
Originally posted by Scot Nice one OP. We live in an age of midget MMO's and you want to know if they are too massive. Maybe in some, but count your lucky stars we have MMO's like that left. The plethora of F2P midget MMO's has taken over the genre, if you were looking at this from the outside that's what a MMO would seem like to you. Small, ribbon like worlds connecting little hubs.
F2P MMOs are nothing but crass cash grabs targeting low information players; sucking cash from idiots in the same way Casinos farm bored old people and welfare recipients.
I'm talking about the direction of AAA and pay to buy or subscribe large scale MMOs, such as GW2 and FF14 etc.
These games open their world to tens of thousands of people in areas that are very crowded and don't feel wild or dangerous like many MMOs used to feel before there was 10k people on every damn server.
I'm looking for Online RPG with hundreds with room to feel like you are exploring and helping overcome challenges. Right now I just don't see that in these games AT ALL. Just looking to see if there is similar sentiment out there. Evidently everyone likes Halo style multiplayer in the MMOs..my bad...
Oh I see where you are coming from now. For me there has always been that feeling that some areas of AAA MMOs are too crowded, it has got worse though. Sometimes it makes sense, like in a city, other times you are meant to be in a wasteland and there are all these other players jumping around.
It is a difficult one to solve, you could overdo zone instances, make the wasteland hold 10 people and then put the next ten in a new instance of that zone. For some supposedly desolate wastelands this would look right but could cause grouping issues.
Any big world MMO is going to be AAA, I can't think of a huge MMO that was built on a budget. So that means that it is going to be a mainstream MMO that is well known and attracting players. As such I do not think you will find what you are looking for.
I am going to put a good word in for Lotro though, as I always do.
It doesn't matter how many players per server you have, what matters is how you organize relationships. Facebook has a billion+ users who could, at any moment, choose to be fiends, but that doesn't mean they are all reading each others' walls.
I'm really not sure how to respond to this comment. I don't see how Facebook has anything to do with gameplay in an MMOs. Those billions of users are not standing next to each other killing the same mobs in endless swarms. Relevance?
Facebook is a game. It just plays differently, but on an abstract level, it's the same concept as an MMO. Don't get hung up on the fact that you don't see your avatar moving around a map or that you aren't swinging a sword at mobs - just focus on the fact that you have a character and you interact with other players who cross your path as your attention moves around.
( at least that's the way I look at it ... if it doesn't feel useful to think of it this way, I won't try to sell you on it any harder )
I say go in the opposite direction, put everybody on one big server.
Players will band together if the game design encourages it. The number of people logged in is irrelevant.
There are certain queer times and occasions in this strange mixed affair we call life when a man takes this whole universe for a vast practical joke, though the wit thereof he but dimly discerns, and more than suspects that the joke is at nobody's expense but his own. -- Herman Melville
Yes they are too massive. Massive and strangely diluted and difused at the same time.
With the instant gratification generation, and the need for things to be accessible at any time, all the time, - everything becomes a cross server, dungeon tool, instanced galore, ready for you to dive into.
The price of the massiveness that allows, is the server community and a sense of being apart of or even invested in that local community, all but dissappears, and is replaced by what can be found within a much smaller unit, which is your guild if you have one.
Unfortunately, this has proven, imo, not to have to same hold on people, that the much more closenit server community had prior to the cross realm instance galore, and so people quit mmo's only to start new ones much more frequently, which without a doubt, has completely changed the face of the genre, and continues to influence the direction of mmo development both with regards to social tools in the game but also content in general.
- And not for the better. I almost feel as if the f2p tendency is atleast partly driven by the fact that mmo's fail to hold a high retention rate these days, and it is not allways because the game just sucks. - But because the game is hollow without the social aspects. And yet, we get so annoyed when we have to deal with people in groups - when we cant just initiate a /kick, or blacklist or leave the dungeon and Q again. - It is such a silly obvious relationship, that bites its own arse, and keeps rotating around while people still look for that one elusive game that could take them back to their Everquest day of yore, while asking for implementations to their mmo, which keeps that dream from being fulfilled.
What I mean with that, is, rather than having conversations, dealing with issues and conflict, and behaving like functioning people, - it is for some reason much easier, and more attractive to alot of people, that the mmo comes with /kick options for groups, and that dungeons require little to no communication at all. Leaving people to be anonymous most of the time while playing and depriving them of what they probably really wanted to play an mmo for in the first place.
Which is a rich and fun game environment, that also has great oppertunities for meaningfull relations with other people all across the world. - The latter is much harder to come by in todays massive mmo's - And I personally am very sad everytime a developer finds another automated addition to the genre, that enables me to not have to deal with other people. I also think it is describtive of the times we live in, which again, just makes me a sad panda when I think about it.
If these environments were not instanced, and groups had to cope with contested pve again, the chaos people imagine wouldnt occur. I know this, because mmo's used to function well with this. We had reason to treat eachother like real human beings, while coexisting in the game. And while you can scoff all you like at this, the loss of it, is imo, the major reason why games are so hollow and shortlived in this era of mmo's. (I also think we deprive young people of a great avenue to learn and practise how the world works when one is not a special snowflake and other people matter as much as they do. Something a staggering amount of them just havent learned)
To be fair OP, FFARR XIV is a recent hyped release game that the herd (or looking for new game players) are all trying out. In three months most of those huge servers will seem empty and this won’t be a problem. It is not uncommon to see developers control how populated a game area is in current times through the use of “shards” or the layering of instances to prevent the contained quests and encounters from being overwhelmed and to keep play of them fun. How populated a shard or instance should ideally be is a choice best left to development teams as they know the content rather than players sitting here in forum trying to guess an appropriate number. It should also be noted that community size does not determine the value of its individual players in a community and that is something more born of play and mechanics.
It doesn't matter how many players per server you have, what matters is how you organize relationships. Facebook has a billion+ users who could, at any moment, choose to be fiends, but that doesn't mean they are all reading each others' walls.
A game like EvE has a single large server where local communities form based on geography. Other games use guilds to let people make subcultures. I think there's a lot of room to explore here ... although I don't have many ideas personally.
I'm really not sure how to respond to this comment. I don't see how Facebook has anything to do with gameplay in an MMOs. Those billions of users are not standing next to each other killing the same mobs in endless swarms. Relevance?
It's one of the most relevant online communities for a topic such as this. The issue isn't how many people per server but how many tools - and the usefulness of those tools - to allow people to connect and form healthy communities. Facebook has millions of people in one environment, but it lets people regulate who they interact with and when. It allows people to choose their 'neighbors' and join groups of like-minded or similar interest individuals.
Facebook let's you take part in the community of your choice, the community size of your choice, spread across the topics of your choice.
The guild system is an extremely primitive, poor substitute for a community tool. It has neither the breadth nor the feature set to support how human beings normally interact in day to day life. Some recent MMOs have made a few efforts toward that end, most notably the ability to take part in and manage contributions to multiple guilds but most MMOs are still a far way off from creating those truly meaningful communities experiences that one can achieve in Facebook.
"Could "community" and players band together around a smaller server size where interaction was a requirement?"
Requiring interaction with strangers doesn't make for better communities, especially when it comes to leisure activities. This is doubly true when you reduce the possible pool of people and groups that one can choose from. The opposite, expanding the pool and providing tools to support the formation of many smaller groups, has proven far more effective in allowing people to build and strengthen ties.
There isn't a "right" or "wrong" way to play, if you want to use a screwdriver to put nails into wood, have at it, simply don't complain when the guy next to you with the hammer is doing it much better and easier. - Allein "Graphics are often supplied by Engines that (some) MMORPG's are built in" - Spuffyre
Recent play time on FF 14 ARR, have led my guild to discuss MMOs in general and an interesting theme among those with disappointments reared up.Are there too many players per server now?How many does it take for a title to be "Massive"Would a few hundred players on a game world the size of Ezorea be enough?Could "community" and players band together around a smaller server size where interaction was a requirement?I'm interested in the communities thoughts on this topic. Especially with a another "AAA" title release (or re-release as it were.)
Massive worlds are fine, but like I said there is no reason for community like there was in the old days of AC.
Recent play time on FF 14 ARR, have led my guild to discuss MMOs in general and an interesting theme among those with disappointments reared up.
Are there too many players per server now?
How many does it take for a title to be "Massive"
Would a few hundred players on a game world the size of Ezorea be enough?
Could "community" and players band together around a smaller server size where interaction was a requirement?
I'm interested in the communities thoughts on this topic. Especially with a another "AAA" title release (or re-release as it were.)
Massive worlds are fine, but like I said there is no reason for community like there was in the old days of AC.
Yes
- monarch/patron system (often abused exclusively for xp but still a tie)
- public gathering halls located near each town
- multiple viable towns so that people can gather where and with whom they want to rather than a single universal hub
There were a lot of neat features that allowed communities to form in AC.
There isn't a "right" or "wrong" way to play, if you want to use a screwdriver to put nails into wood, have at it, simply don't complain when the guy next to you with the hammer is doing it much better and easier. - Allein "Graphics are often supplied by Engines that (some) MMORPG's are built in" - Spuffyre
I think many have touched on this point in this thread.. MMO's are supposed to be massive.. We WANT an active community.
Too many games are out there (and in production) that claim to be an MMO - but are actually quite solo with a hint of instance based areas.
You would probably cherish a large community more if you "Actually needed them".. todays mmo's are solo and you dont need to group ever to make it to end game.
I think the problem lies in the server tech these company uses when releasing a mmos.. First i don't get why companies doubt there product @ launch (Looking @ Blizz and Square as a few culprit.) Sure the launch rush is no joke and as such, i would think buy now they have a que system early out, if a server is bombarded with more than 20 (rough #) login request then a que is triggered..
Square claimed at first there server limit was 2k in the major city areas, which is no joke, then they had to ramp it up to 5k.. Now what if there tech was set @ 10k, then you ramp down or up in later months once rush wore off and you get an idea where you stand...
Its just a baffle that these companies keeps miss judging the launch hype as per say of there mmo..
To be fair OP, FFARR XIV is a recent hyped release game that the herd (or looking for new game players) are all trying out. In three months most of those huge servers will seem empty and this won’t be a problem. It is not uncommon to see developers control how populated a game area is in current times through the use of “shards” or the layering of instances to prevent the contained quests and encounters from being overwhelmed and to keep play of them fun. How populated a shard or instance should ideally be is a choice best left to development teams as they know the content rather than players sitting here in forum trying to guess an appropriate number. It should also be noted that community size does not determine the value of its individual players in a community and that is something more born of play and mechanics.
I have to completely disagree with you with regard to developers.
These are the same people that had to total scrap and re-do and entire MMO that had cost them tens of millions of dollars to create.
These are the same developers that recent admit their ideas with Pandaria were garbage.
The same developers that created Star Wars and then had to make it F2P in less than a year.
The same developers that couldn't even setup enough servers to handle the pre-orders and existing accounts that were out there.
Sorry mate, but that argument doesn't hold water. These developers are trying variations of the same formula and getting the same tepid, partially success results.
I'm imploring the developers and community at large to consider some alternate strategies and explore some new ideas. Which seem ridiculously missing in todays games. FF14 ARR doesn't have a single, not a single, unique idea. Not even one after 7 years of development. The crafting is great but not new.
I happen to believe that a part of the problem with that formula is that the MMO is like a New York street:
Thousands of faces that you happen across briefly and then move on. Occasionally you pick up something they dropped and hand it to them with a quick smile, but then you move on. I feel like I man that lonely New Yorker surrounded by thousands all to busy with whatever it is they are doing alone to notice there are people around they could interact with. And that's the issue, there is no reason or reward for much meaningful interaction.
I think many have touched on this point in this thread.. MMO's are supposed to be massive.. We WANT an active community.
Too many games are out there (and in production) that claim to be an MMO - but are actually quite solo with a hint of instance based areas.
You would probably cherish a large community more if you "Actually needed them".. todays mmo's are solo and you dont need to group ever to make it to end game.
I agree with this sentiment in general. However, I believe that "Massive" is a part of the problem. Not the only one, not a fix all. Just one of the main causes for stagnation and a lack of community. Obviously the new focus on twitter like single player content is a big part of the issues too.
I just think this is one that if people thought about it, maybe they could trade massive for good community. Very few games have ever achieved both, so why not try for the latter and see how it works out?
I think the problem lies in the server tech these company uses when releasing a mmos.. First i don't get why companies doubt there product @ launch (Looking @ Blizz and Square as a few culprit.) Sure the launch rush is no joke and as such, i would think buy now they have a que system early out, if a server is bombarded with more than 20 (rough #) login request then a que is triggered..
Square claimed at first there server limit was 2k in the major city areas, which is no joke, then they had to ramp it up to 5k.. Now what if there tech was set @ 10k, then you ramp down or up in later months once rush wore off and you get an idea where you stand...
Its just a baffle that these companies keeps miss judging the launch hype as per say of there mmo..
Hi, I really like these quotes from Asheron's Call on how they dealt with getting areas/servers bombarded.
The phenomena that caused players to be teleported to the outskirts of a city once it got too crowded. Sometimes, this caused them to be teleported out to a dangerous, monster-laden area.
Asheron's Call was technically innovative for its time. It did not use zoning, a technique of partitioning the game world into zones that ran on different computers on a cluster. This caused delay when moving between zones. Instead Asheron's Call had a single seamless world. It used dynamic load balancing to determine which computer in the cluster controlled which location area. If one area became overpopulated and sluggish control of part of that location would pass to another computer with a lighter load.[15]
The finished product contained approximately 2 million lines of code.
There cant be too many players. Worlds are just too small and badly structured.
EDIT: Maybe not worlds a badly structured but rather its gameplay problem "forcing" people to do the same stuff at the same palce.
That's the inverse of my statement though. Too many people for too small a space. Not enough real estate. That's what this comes down to for me and some few others.
The problem with developers increasing the size of the land is all the blow back about "travel time" you hear form today's twitter generation. If you built a world large enough to have 10k people in it, it would likely be so massive it would time hours to travel it...So I propose using the same size worlds with smaller populations more spread out. In a world fraught with danger....
I say go in the opposite direction, put everybody on one big server.
Players will band together if the game design encourages it. The number of people logged in is irrelevant.
I'm not sure what that would look like. But I'm completely uninterested in seeing it.
Ever been to a football game with 80-100k people in a stadium? Questing in such a game would be like looking for quarters on the ground after the game was over and everyone was heading for their car. Now imagine all those people looking for the same 10 quarters...
I think the general consensus was "no, we want millions of people" in our MMO's.
But I agree with you OP, I find it unecessary in many games ( but not all) and also that it can sometimes be problematic in gameplay as well.
That thread is almost 2 years old and only 3 pages long, this discussion has already lasted longer and had more positive- agreement statements.
I need to find a developer to take this message to, there's got to be someone out there with the stones to give something different a try with a few millions..
I think the problem lies in the server tech these company uses when releasing a mmos.. First i don't get why companies doubt there product @ launch (Looking @ Blizz and Square as a few culprit.) Sure the launch rush is no joke and as such, i would think buy now they have a que system early out, if a server is bombarded with more than 20 (rough #) login request then a que is triggered..
Square claimed at first there server limit was 2k in the major city areas, which is no joke, then they had to ramp it up to 5k.. Now what if there tech was set @ 10k, then you ramp down or up in later months once rush wore off and you get an idea where you stand...
Its just a baffle that these companies keeps miss judging the launch hype as per say of there mmo..
Hi, I really like these quotes from Asheron's Call on how they dealt with getting areas/servers bombarded.
Portal Storm
The phenomena that caused players to be teleported to the outskirts of a city once it got too crowded. Sometimes, this caused them to be teleported out to a dangerous, monster-laden area.
Asheron's Call was technically innovative for its time. It did not use zoning, a technique of partitioning the game world into zones that ran on different computers on a cluster. This caused delay when moving between zones. Instead Asheron's Call had a single seamless world. It used dynamic load balancing to determine which computer in the cluster controlled which location area. If one area became overpopulated and sluggish control of part of that location would pass to another computer with a lighter load.[15]
The finished product contained approximately 2 million lines of code.
I happen to believe that a part of the problem with that formula is that the MMO is like a New York street:
Thousands of faces that you happen across briefly and then move on. Occasionally you pick up something they dropped and hand it to them with a quick smile, but then you move on. I feel like I man that lonely New Yorker surrounded by thousands all to busy with whatever it is they are doing alone to notice there are people around they could interact with. And that's the issue, there is no reason or reward for much meaningful interaction.
And yet, somehow, New Yorkers do manage to belong to multiple communities, social circles and intimate groups. It seems the more sensible approach would be to emulate how they go about doing that rather than to create contrived scenarios or conditions to force an environment that human beings (present day, at least) simply aren't wired for.
There isn't a "right" or "wrong" way to play, if you want to use a screwdriver to put nails into wood, have at it, simply don't complain when the guy next to you with the hammer is doing it much better and easier. - Allein "Graphics are often supplied by Engines that (some) MMORPG's are built in" - Spuffyre
Originally posted by Quirhid Smaller communities have their advantages.
Whooo, but be prepared for The Gossips (younger cousins of The Fates).
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.
Comments
I'm really not sure how to respond to this comment. I don't see how Facebook has anything to do with gameplay in an MMOs. Those billions of users are not standing next to each other killing the same mobs in endless swarms. Relevance?
I'm glad you mention Eve, had you read this discussion you find that I claim that Eve does massive very well. It has a HUGE galaxy with thousands of stars to explore and a concurrent actual user base in the 20000s. That's great, but because of its huge size and the design of the stations it doesn't feel crowded.
When I say games shouldn't be "Massive" I'm talking about this insistence on current games to open up servers and dungeon finders to tens of thousands of players that immediately begin ignoring each other beyond Chuck Norris jokes in regional chats.
F2P MMOs are nothing but crass cash grabs targeting low information players; sucking cash from idiots in the same way Casinos farm bored old people and welfare recipients.
I'm talking about the direction of AAA and pay to buy or subscribe large scale MMOs, such as GW2 and FF14 etc.
These games open their world to tens of thousands of people in areas that are very crowded and don't feel wild or dangerous like many MMOs used to feel before there was 10k people on every damn server.
I'm looking for Online RPG with hundreds with room to feel like you are exploring and helping overcome challenges. Right now I just don't see that in these games AT ALL. Just looking to see if there is similar sentiment out there. Evidently everyone likes Halo style multiplayer in the MMOs..my bad...
Oh I see where you are coming from now. For me there has always been that feeling that some areas of AAA MMOs are too crowded, it has got worse though. Sometimes it makes sense, like in a city, other times you are meant to be in a wasteland and there are all these other players jumping around.
It is a difficult one to solve, you could overdo zone instances, make the wasteland hold 10 people and then put the next ten in a new instance of that zone. For some supposedly desolate wastelands this would look right but could cause grouping issues.
Any big world MMO is going to be AAA, I can't think of a huge MMO that was built on a budget. So that means that it is going to be a mainstream MMO that is well known and attracting players. As such I do not think you will find what you are looking for.
I am going to put a good word in for Lotro though, as I always do.
Facebook is a game. It just plays differently, but on an abstract level, it's the same concept as an MMO. Don't get hung up on the fact that you don't see your avatar moving around a map or that you aren't swinging a sword at mobs - just focus on the fact that you have a character and you interact with other players who cross your path as your attention moves around.
( at least that's the way I look at it ... if it doesn't feel useful to think of it this way, I won't try to sell you on it any harder )
http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/thread/332989/page/1
I think the general consensus was "no, we want millions of people" in our MMO's.
But I agree with you OP, I find it unecessary in many games ( but not all) and also that it can sometimes be problematic in gameplay as well.
FFA Nonconsentual Full Loot PvP ...You know you want it!!
I say go in the opposite direction, put everybody on one big server.
Players will band together if the game design encourages it. The number of people logged in is irrelevant.
There are certain queer times and occasions in this strange mixed affair we call life when a man takes this whole universe for a vast practical joke, though the wit thereof he but dimly discerns, and more than suspects that the joke is at nobody's expense but his own.
-- Herman Melville
Yes they are too massive. Massive and strangely diluted and difused at the same time.
With the instant gratification generation, and the need for things to be accessible at any time, all the time, - everything becomes a cross server, dungeon tool, instanced galore, ready for you to dive into.
The price of the massiveness that allows, is the server community and a sense of being apart of or even invested in that local community, all but dissappears, and is replaced by what can be found within a much smaller unit, which is your guild if you have one.
Unfortunately, this has proven, imo, not to have to same hold on people, that the much more closenit server community had prior to the cross realm instance galore, and so people quit mmo's only to start new ones much more frequently, which without a doubt, has completely changed the face of the genre, and continues to influence the direction of mmo development both with regards to social tools in the game but also content in general.
- And not for the better. I almost feel as if the f2p tendency is atleast partly driven by the fact that mmo's fail to hold a high retention rate these days, and it is not allways because the game just sucks. - But because the game is hollow without the social aspects. And yet, we get so annoyed when we have to deal with people in groups - when we cant just initiate a /kick, or blacklist or leave the dungeon and Q again. - It is such a silly obvious relationship, that bites its own arse, and keeps rotating around while people still look for that one elusive game that could take them back to their Everquest day of yore, while asking for implementations to their mmo, which keeps that dream from being fulfilled.
What I mean with that, is, rather than having conversations, dealing with issues and conflict, and behaving like functioning people, - it is for some reason much easier, and more attractive to alot of people, that the mmo comes with /kick options for groups, and that dungeons require little to no communication at all. Leaving people to be anonymous most of the time while playing and depriving them of what they probably really wanted to play an mmo for in the first place.
Which is a rich and fun game environment, that also has great oppertunities for meaningfull relations with other people all across the world. - The latter is much harder to come by in todays massive mmo's - And I personally am very sad everytime a developer finds another automated addition to the genre, that enables me to not have to deal with other people. I also think it is describtive of the times we live in, which again, just makes me a sad panda when I think about it.
If these environments were not instanced, and groups had to cope with contested pve again, the chaos people imagine wouldnt occur. I know this, because mmo's used to function well with this. We had reason to treat eachother like real human beings, while coexisting in the game. And while you can scoff all you like at this, the loss of it, is imo, the major reason why games are so hollow and shortlived in this era of mmo's. (I also think we deprive young people of a great avenue to learn and practise how the world works when one is not a special snowflake and other people matter as much as they do. Something a staggering amount of them just havent learned)
anyway, yeah.
To be fair OP, FFARR XIV is a recent hyped release game that the herd (or looking for new game players) are all trying out. In three months most of those huge servers will seem empty and this won’t be a problem. It is not uncommon to see developers control how populated a game area is in current times through the use of “shards” or the layering of instances to prevent the contained quests and encounters from being overwhelmed and to keep play of them fun. How populated a shard or instance should ideally be is a choice best left to development teams as they know the content rather than players sitting here in forum trying to guess an appropriate number. It should also be noted that community size does not determine the value of its individual players in a community and that is something more born of play and mechanics.
Just throwing this out there.
What if a game gave you an option of how many people could be in the game world with you ?
Say a choice between 10, 100, 1000 and unlimited. Would this be a good game feature to have? And is it possible?
Don't know, just asking.
FFA Nonconsentual Full Loot PvP ...You know you want it!!
The only game i've had the slight feeling of massive from is Eve Online, so in no way do i feel games have become "to massive".
It's one of the most relevant online communities for a topic such as this. The issue isn't how many people per server but how many tools - and the usefulness of those tools - to allow people to connect and form healthy communities. Facebook has millions of people in one environment, but it lets people regulate who they interact with and when. It allows people to choose their 'neighbors' and join groups of like-minded or similar interest individuals.
Facebook let's you take part in the community of your choice, the community size of your choice, spread across the topics of your choice.
The guild system is an extremely primitive, poor substitute for a community tool. It has neither the breadth nor the feature set to support how human beings normally interact in day to day life. Some recent MMOs have made a few efforts toward that end, most notably the ability to take part in and manage contributions to multiple guilds but most MMOs are still a far way off from creating those truly meaningful communities experiences that one can achieve in Facebook.
"Could "community" and players band together around a smaller server size where interaction was a requirement?"
Requiring interaction with strangers doesn't make for better communities, especially when it comes to leisure activities. This is doubly true when you reduce the possible pool of people and groups that one can choose from. The opposite, expanding the pool and providing tools to support the formation of many smaller groups, has proven far more effective in allowing people to build and strengthen ties.
There isn't a "right" or "wrong" way to play, if you want to use a screwdriver to put nails into wood, have at it, simply don't complain when the guy next to you with the hammer is doing it much better and easier. - Allein
"Graphics are often supplied by Engines that (some) MMORPG's are built in" - Spuffyre
Massive worlds are fine, but like I said there is no reason for community like there was in the old days of AC.Yes
There were a lot of neat features that allowed communities to form in AC.
There isn't a "right" or "wrong" way to play, if you want to use a screwdriver to put nails into wood, have at it, simply don't complain when the guy next to you with the hammer is doing it much better and easier. - Allein
"Graphics are often supplied by Engines that (some) MMORPG's are built in" - Spuffyre
I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been -Wayne Gretzky
I think many have touched on this point in this thread.. MMO's are supposed to be massive.. We WANT an active community.
Too many games are out there (and in production) that claim to be an MMO - but are actually quite solo with a hint of instance based areas.
You would probably cherish a large community more if you "Actually needed them".. todays mmo's are solo and you dont need to group ever to make it to end game.
G.E.Schaefer
Played: EQ1. EQ2. FFXI. SWG. Aion. WAR. LOTRO. TabulaRasa. Hellgate London. Diablo 1. Diablo II. Diablo 3. STO. WOW. Vanguard. Guild Wars. Rift. Terra. The Secret World. EVE. Guild Wars 2. Firefall. Neverwinter.
I think the problem lies in the server tech these company uses when releasing a mmos.. First i don't get why companies doubt there product @ launch (Looking @ Blizz and Square as a few culprit.) Sure the launch rush is no joke and as such, i would think buy now they have a que system early out, if a server is bombarded with more than 20 (rough #) login request then a que is triggered..
Square claimed at first there server limit was 2k in the major city areas, which is no joke, then they had to ramp it up to 5k.. Now what if there tech was set @ 10k, then you ramp down or up in later months once rush wore off and you get an idea where you stand...
Its just a baffle that these companies keeps miss judging the launch hype as per say of there mmo..
I have to completely disagree with you with regard to developers.
These are the same people that had to total scrap and re-do and entire MMO that had cost them tens of millions of dollars to create.
These are the same developers that recent admit their ideas with Pandaria were garbage.
The same developers that created Star Wars and then had to make it F2P in less than a year.
The same developers that couldn't even setup enough servers to handle the pre-orders and existing accounts that were out there.
Sorry mate, but that argument doesn't hold water. These developers are trying variations of the same formula and getting the same tepid, partially success results.
I'm imploring the developers and community at large to consider some alternate strategies and explore some new ideas. Which seem ridiculously missing in todays games. FF14 ARR doesn't have a single, not a single, unique idea. Not even one after 7 years of development. The crafting is great but not new.
I happen to believe that a part of the problem with that formula is that the MMO is like a New York street:
Thousands of faces that you happen across briefly and then move on. Occasionally you pick up something they dropped and hand it to them with a quick smile, but then you move on. I feel like I man that lonely New Yorker surrounded by thousands all to busy with whatever it is they are doing alone to notice there are people around they could interact with. And that's the issue, there is no reason or reward for much meaningful interaction.
I agree with this sentiment in general. However, I believe that "Massive" is a part of the problem. Not the only one, not a fix all. Just one of the main causes for stagnation and a lack of community. Obviously the new focus on twitter like single player content is a big part of the issues too.
I just think this is one that if people thought about it, maybe they could trade massive for good community. Very few games have ever achieved both, so why not try for the latter and see how it works out?
Hi, I really like these quotes from Asheron's Call on how they dealt with getting areas/servers bombarded.
The phenomena that caused players to be teleported to the outskirts of a city once it got too crowded. Sometimes, this caused them to be teleported out to a dangerous, monster-laden area.
Asheron's Call was technically innovative for its time. It did not use zoning, a technique of partitioning the game world into zones that ran on different computers on a cluster. This caused delay when moving between zones. Instead Asheron's Call had a single seamless world. It used dynamic load balancing to determine which computer in the cluster controlled which location area. If one area became overpopulated and sluggish control of part of that location would pass to another computer with a lighter load.[15]
The finished product contained approximately 2 million lines of code.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asheron's_Call
Asheron's Call wiki
http://johnny-monsarrat.com/ - check out this awesome story on how they started!! very inspiring
That's the inverse of my statement though. Too many people for too small a space. Not enough real estate. That's what this comes down to for me and some few others.
The problem with developers increasing the size of the land is all the blow back about "travel time" you hear form today's twitter generation. If you built a world large enough to have 10k people in it, it would likely be so massive it would time hours to travel it...So I propose using the same size worlds with smaller populations more spread out. In a world fraught with danger....
I'm not sure what that would look like. But I'm completely uninterested in seeing it.
Ever been to a football game with 80-100k people in a stadium? Questing in such a game would be like looking for quarters on the ground after the game was over and everyone was heading for their car. Now imagine all those people looking for the same 10 quarters...
No thanks...
That thread is almost 2 years old and only 3 pages long, this discussion has already lasted longer and had more positive- agreement statements.
I need to find a developer to take this message to, there's got to be someone out there with the stones to give something different a try with a few millions..
And yet, somehow, New Yorkers do manage to belong to multiple communities, social circles and intimate groups.
It seems the more sensible approach would be to emulate how they go about doing that rather than to create contrived scenarios or conditions to force an environment that human beings (present day, at least) simply aren't wired for.
There isn't a "right" or "wrong" way to play, if you want to use a screwdriver to put nails into wood, have at it, simply don't complain when the guy next to you with the hammer is doing it much better and easier. - Allein
"Graphics are often supplied by Engines that (some) MMORPG's are built in" - Spuffyre
Whooo, but be prepared for The Gossips (younger cousins of The Fates).
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.