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Single Player Game Features You Like and-or Would Like to See in an MMORPG
nariusseldon
Member EpicPosts: 27,775
Keep On Topic.
This is NOT about differences between Single Player Game (SP) and MMORPGs.
This is about what features from SINGLE PLAYER GAME you liked and-or would like to see in an MMORPG.
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This thread is another brain picking session.
First, let me say this section can only be answered by people whom have actually played SINGLE PLAYER GAMES, and this is because of the nature of the question...
What features from Single Player Games would you want
to see in an MMORPG, and how would you implement it?
Added Alt Question :
What Single Player Game did you like in Single Player Games?
Things to keep in mind with replies :
- Single Player Game sessions involved a single player playing alone.
- There was a certain feel to how everything worked in a session throughout the entire gameplay session.
Let us see where this leads... 
Comments
Thats a tough question that for me is very hard to answer.
I mean I enjoyed the Elder Scrolls games. I also enjoyed Red Dead Redemption immensely and I think I have to getback to that one.
And I recently played a few of the Lego games, granted I played them coop with another person but they were much better than I expected.
Single player games are games where you truly do feel you can be the hero, or at least the center of the story. Not so in an MMO. A thousand Frodo's running around in LoTRO does seem a bit ridiculous.
I just think it is better to keep those kind of games separate. I do wish more of the kind of game mechanics I saw in the Lego games was in MMO's. You really did not level those characters but you did find increasing challenges as you moved through the game.
Perhaps the best single player game feature I would like to see in an MMO would be the difficulty setting. Let players choose a world with a level of difficulty that suits their playstyle. That alone would make a lot of MMO's enjoyable for more people I think.
FFA Nonconsentual Full Loot PvP ...You know you want it!!
Ehehe. *puffs up chest like a pouter pigeon* But sir! Your request for single-player game features assumes that these features aren't already in MMOs! Isn't the topic thus inherently about the difference between single players games and MMOs?
But seriously, I want dating sim interactions with NPCs in my MMOs. I also want the appearance of the game world I see to be affected by my actions, even if other players don't see the same thing. If I heal the plagey antelopes I want to see healthy antelopes bounding happily around, darn it! None of this 'heal 5 and that's good enough even though every antelope you see still looks sick' BS. If I rebuild a broken bridge I want to see my nice new bridge and be able to walk over it whenever I want, even if that means other players who haven't rebuilt the bridge have to see me walking through thin air or vanishing at one side of the river to reappear at the other - they're big kids, they can deal with that.
LoL , yea I think we have all done the "could you thin out these rats a little bit for me and I will reward you"!
And after killing ten rats the guy is still knee deep in rats but gives you the reward anyway. You almost feel like you should kill the guy and take his money because he is never going to be rid of these rats. Either that or he will go broke trying!
In other words, scripted quests have to go. They work in single player becasue you can get rid of the rats. In an MMO it is just like you are a rat in a maze. Do this and we will give you cocaine!
Ok now do it again and you can have more!
FFA Nonconsentual Full Loot PvP ...You know you want it!!
This is how I play skyrim
Play an hour for first time playing "vanilla sucks compared to mods"
get 100 mods
Wow there is adult s* mods. Gets 30 of those
OOo look body physics of naughtiness *downloads*
Wow these graphics mods make it best looking game to ever come out that even look better than consoles yet to be released in the year 2020 *downloads*...now these are graphics of the future *never leaves game*
ooo look anime mods *download*
oooo look star wars mods *downloads them all*
lord of the rings? IN SKYRIM! HELL YEAH *downloads them all*
What is this? Starcraft...warcraft...magick! *downloads till there is no downloads left*
wow I can add so many lands its bigger than even ESO? A multi milion dollar MMO? *downloads them all*
Why so many new race mods
*downloads hundreds of them to add hundreds of races in the game*
Wow I can have realistic necromancy, necrophilia, realistic hunting, survival, hunger/thirst? *downloads them all*
I don't think any MMO is THAT epic :P
Oh I forgot...
Hey! I can custom build my own house! Like a modern day UO housing system!
Look at that I can build a huge fort city! Sweet
I can be king of all of Skyrim!
I can make a gigantic city with tons of people living in it! Like old SWG days!
Wow I can go into space and go to different planets/planes? SWEET
My Skyrim, Fallout 4, Starbound and WoW + other game mods at MODDB:
https://www.moddb.com/mods/skyrim-anime-overhaul
ESO uses phasing to get rid of that problem. Like when you get rid of the werewolves from a town and they are no longer there anymore after finishing the quest.
I'd like to see an MMO in a universe similar to Deus Ex but not heavily story oriented. Have the setup similar to EVE with High/Low/Null Sec zones - maybe within one or multiple cities. NPC Corporations you could do missions for to grind rep, LP stores similar to EVE and the the way EVE lets you grind rep to reduce costs associated with that faction reprocessing, prodiuction, research, etc.
I guess EVE but ground based not flying space ships but set a couple of 2-300 years from now.
There is already enough 'mmo's' that are primarily focused on single player content.
So how about not a single thing?
There's only one thing I'd want from Single Player Games put into MMO's, but there's a lot of things I'd take out of MMO's so they're less like single player games. But on topic, the one thing I'd add is combat fluidity. I'm so bored of MMO's that just have you sit in front of a mob, pressing 1, 2, 3, 2, 3, 4, 1, 1 and waiting for the hitpoints to drop.
The best example of what I'd like to see is Shadow of Mordor. The ability to fight 20 different mobs at the same time with such control and fluidity is just amazing. The game also has experience advancement and a semi-open world, so it's not that far removed from MMO's. The old 1, 2, 3, 2, 3, 4 gameplay was due to connection and processing speed problems of the time, there's no reason those still need to exist. If you can get 30+ people in an FPS with aircraft, tanks and boats rushing about, I'm sure they can manage to build a better combat system than those of old.
I thought we already had just about everything they could think of from solo gaming stuffed into MMO's without concern for the negative impact on multiplayer gameplay?
But I will bring up one idea, side games are more prevalent in solo than multiplayer games. A card game within a MMO or the like, properly intermeshed with the MMOs gameplay could work well. But as we have seen they just tend to shoe horn solo elements in regardless of their impact. The card game for example could take away too much from other play rather than complementing it. And that's how the history of picking ideas from different genres has gone for MMOs, they have worked against other elements of gameplay, not gone in tandem with them.
- open world from Skyrim would work beautifully in PvP focused MMOs
- skill based combat from Dark Messiah to support better PvP in MMO
- semi-full loot from Skyrim (bags+weapon)
And you don't get disconnected for being afk for 15 minutes either! :P
My SWTOR referral link for those wanting to give the game a try. (Newbies get a welcome package while returning players get a few account upgrades to help with their preferred status.)
https://www.ashesofcreation.com/ref/Callaron/
Class balancing. I know classes have to be relative balanced in mmo's but I'm just tired of Developers tinkering with class balance instead of adding "real content" . In singleplayer games who cares about balance.
No lag/latency issues... ( I can dream cant I )
Not much else I can think of actually. I would like more phasing, but dividing the same area in multiple phases might not be such a great idea. At least have a few main quests with phasing, that realy helps bringing the world alive.
I actually think class balance is not needed in an MMORPG (PvE only). All you need is an interesting world to explore with interesting classes that fit into the lore. That's mostly how original PnP games were made.
I'm not sure we should be so close minded as to look at an MMO and say it has to have solo questing, PvP, group PvE, and raid PvE that all has to be segregated. I think a better way to design a game would be to say we want to make a fun world for people to explore and play in. We want to give them the tools to do that. If they want to group up to try and take on higher level/skilled mobs at a lower level then they are welcome to do so. If the player wants to try to solo with a certain class/skill they can do so. If the player just wants to craft, build houses, gather resources they can do so. If the player wants to go and explore/adventure/kill monsters they can do so. If the player wants to be a Ranger/Hunter and live in the woods they can do so. If the player wants to team up with others and build a colony they can do so.
I'm not certain why MMOs have to have x in the game and everything has to be separated. To me that detracts from the entire experience of playing the game. Instances detract from the experience of the game because it makes the game into a single player experience. You have to go out of your way to have interactions. Those interactions are usually not as fun as the random ones you would have forced upon you.
Hopefully one day we can drop these ideas of having games just being esports or books on rails and get back to RPGing in a persistent world with other people. There are so many good single player PvE and PvP games out there that are catered to just those things. We don't need to have them in MMORPGs IMO.
yeah .. i found your posts to be good discussions & entertaining (despite we don't agree on what we like in games), so i figure .. i should expand the discussion, and do it in your honor. I am glad you notice!
haha .. we agree here. This is one item i raise all the time. There is no reason why there cannot be more difficulty levels in MMOs .. and actually some MMOs do have it partially (like normal vs heroic dungeons).
a) Not every feature in single player game makes it to MMOs even if a lot do. For example, i have not seen good stealth mechanics in MMOs.
b) nope ... again, use the stealth mechanics as an example ... it is about how this can or cannot make sense in a MMO .. so differences between SP & MMOs may be relevant, but the discussion can still be focused on the feature itself.
why is original pnp games relevant to video games which are so different?
and many single player pve & pvp games are now considered MMOs (like warframe, or MOBAs ...) ... i would say we need them in *some* MMOs.
In fact, since this is my topic, i would say just forget about the traditional Wow-like MMORPGs, and use the broadened definition. The discussions will be more open and more fun.
(3) can be done in MMOs with instances, phasing, and other tricks.
(1) can be done if you play MMOs as single player games (i.e. in instances).
I would rather they focused on the massively multiplayer aspect of the games. Since that's what makes MMORPGs unique. Could they take the odd feature from a single player game? Sure. Thing is why do that when you could concentrate on what makes a MMORPG stand out not try to turn it into a single player game, they already have single player games.
Every feature from a single player game would have to pass through a "making it work in massively multiplayer" filter anyway so why not start with designing the features around multiplayer in the first place.
"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/Why do you care about balance? You said you would like to play alone in MMOs. In single player games balance doesn't matter at all. Skyrim is a good example.
I did like the stealth in EverQuest. Only the Rogue could do it (as far as I remember), activating Hide and Sneak at the same time to move around unseen. It wasn't entirely realistic as you could sneak right in front of mobs, but it was still very fun and quite exciting. I remember doing it during a raid to scout ahead and my heart was pounding so hard I thought I was on a date with Scarlett Johansson.