Posts Tagged "game mechanics"

• The Daily Grind: Do you judge all MMOs by the same standard?

  Hots Games
  

  Filed under: Fantasy, Culture, Game mechanics, MMO industry, Opinion, The Daily Grind, Xsyon, Sandbox

  One of the challenges facing sandbox developers is the fact that recent themepark MMORPGs have raised the bar in terms of smooth launches and relatively bug-free experiences. Aside from EVE Online, most of the current sandboxes on offer are small indie affairs known as much for their rough-around-the-edges implementation as for their feature innovations.

  And yet, many so-called sandbox fans seem to expect games like Xsyon, Darkfall, and others to be as polished as World of Warcraft, RIFT, and other themeparks with fewer features and several times the budget.

  For today’s Daily Grind, we’d like to know how much (if any) slack you cut developers of sandbox and/or indie MMOs. Do you hold these games to the same standard that you hold a triple-A themepark?

  Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today’s Daily Grind!

  The Daily Grind: Do you judge all MMOs by the same standard? originally appeared on Massively on Thu, 17 May 2012 08:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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• MindArk giving away Entropia Universe land deeds

  Hots Games
  

  Filed under: Sci-fi, Entropia Universe, Business models, Game mechanics, Free-to-play, Promotions

  MindArk has given new meaning to the term phat lewt with its latest update for Entropia Universe. Players may now acquire one of a thousand Planet Calypso land deeds simply by hunting, mining, or crafting while in game.

  Each land deed carries a real-world value of $100 (and deeds are often sold for much more on the open market), according to a MindArk press release. The deeds also provide revenue sharing through the game’s citizenship program. Deeds began dropping yesterday, and MindArk says that they will continue to do so throughout 2012.

  Planet Calypso is the oldest planetary playfield in Entropia Universe. The game boasts more than one million registered accounts and over $400 million in annual user-to-user transactions.

  [Source: MindArk press release]

  MindArk giving away Entropia Universe land deeds originally appeared on Massively on Wed, 16 May 2012 10:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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• The Soapbox: Translating Elder Scrolls Online dev speak

  Hots Games
  

  Filed under: Fantasy, Game mechanics, MMO industry, New titles, Opinion, The Soapbox, Sandbox, The Elder Scrolls Online

  Disclaimer: The Soapbox column is entirely the opinion of this week’s writer and does not necessarily reflect the views of Massively as a whole. If you’re afraid of opinions other than your own, you might want to skip this column.

  Language is a pretty fascinating thing, and studying a second one is something I’ve long intended to do. Aside from entertaining thoughts of learning Korean to play ArcheAge, though (seriously, I looked into it), I haven’t gotten around to much beyond college-level Deutsch.

  But as I watched last week’s interview with The Elder Scrolls Online creative director Paul Sage, I realized that I already have some pretty good second-language skills. I’m fluent in both English and MMO dev-speak, so as a public service, I’m going to translate some of what Sage said into the former.

  Continue reading The Soapbox: Translating Elder Scrolls Online dev speak

  The Soapbox: Translating Elder Scrolls Online dev speak originally appeared on Massively on Tue, 15 May 2012 12:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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• Cryptic developer: Star Trek Online PvP is ‘fail’

  Hots Games
  

  Filed under: Sci-fi, Game mechanics, MMO industry, PvP, News items, Star Trek Online, Free-to-play

  How many times have you read a forum post that says insert-random-MMO’s PvP sucks? Well, in Star Trek Online PvP actually does suck, and that’s straight from the mouth of a developer. It’s so bad, in fact, that Dan “Gozer” Griffis makes no bones about the fact that it could even be removed from Cryptic’s sci-fi MMO.

  “Right now because PVP is in such bad shape we (the developers) have to decide if we think we can turn this problem around. Participation in PVP-related activities is so low on an hourly, daily, weekly, and monthly basis that we could in fact just completely take it out of STO and it would not impact the overall number of people [who] log in to the game and play in any significant way.”

  Griffis goes on to say that he is the only developer currently working on PvP, and as such he has to make some hard choices. He has a plan, and though he hasn’t shared specifics on it yet, he says there are huge changes in store over the next year.

  [Thanks to everyone who sent this in!]

  Cryptic developer: Star Trek Online PvP is ‘fail’ originally appeared on Massively on Sat, 12 May 2012 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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• The Daily Grind: Do you grind for fluff items?

  Hots Games
  

  Filed under: Fantasy, Lord of the Rings Online, Game mechanics, MMO industry, Opinion, Free-to-play, The Daily Grind, Anniversary

  Lord of the Rings Online’s anniversary festival has another six days to go, which just might be enough time for me to grind out the tokens necessary to complete my map collection (and the spiffy Eriador Cartographile title that comes with it).

  I say “grind” here pretty loosely, as the horse-races, fireworks displays, and dwarven beer-brawling are highly enjoyable even though I’ve done them dozens of times each at this point.

  What about you, dear readers? What’s your tolerance when it comes to grinding for fluff items? Do you do it, and what’s the best (or worst) such grind you’ve ever experienced?

  Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today’s Daily Grind!

  The Daily Grind: Do you grind for fluff items? originally appeared on Massively on Tue, 24 Apr 2012 08:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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• Illyriad MMORTS adding emergent mob distribution

  Hots Games
  

  Filed under: Fantasy, Game mechanics, MMO industry, Patches, News items, Free-to-play, MMORTS

  Large-scale game changes are a risky endeavor when it comes to MMOs. Today’s Illyriad update is no exception, though we’re excited to see what happens as the title switches from randomly generated world biology to an “organic and emergent model.”

  Animal distributions will now take habitats, breeding, and migration into account, and players will notice various critters moving around the map and behaving in a more logical manner. “Now, each pack or herd of animals will be tracked in real time, its population increasing over time, and the pack splitting when the population grows to a certain point. Players will be able to dramatically impact the sizes of animal populations, which will have multiple consequences,” says Illyriad founder James Niesewand.

  The tweaks are part of a warmup to the game’s extended trade and economic revamp which is due later this year.

  [Source: Illyriad Games press release]

  Illyriad MMORTS adding emergent mob distribution originally appeared on Massively on Sun, 22 Apr 2012 12:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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• BioWare publishes this week’s SWTOR community Q&A, preps for next week

  Hots Games
  

  Filed under: Sci-fi, Game mechanics, MMO industry, News items, Star Wars: The Old Republic, Community Q&A

  BioWare has published a selection of community questions (and answers) on its official Star Wars: The Old Republic website. The firm is making a concerted effort to reach out to its players lately, and the Q&A is the latest effort that comes on the heels of a website revamp and the in-game rakghoul plague.

  Combat designer Cameron Winston fields a query about SWTOR’s threat mechanics, while lead designer Damion Schubert talks about the logic behind the equipment available at commendation vendors. “We don’t want you to get all of the pieces of an armor set from any one source of gear. We want you to do multiple activities in the game to build out a full set of gear. This is a conscious decision on our part to encourage and reward playing multiple facets of the game. So you should do other things — heroics, check the GTN, etc. — the full set of gear is out there,” he explains.

  BioWare has also made two new discussion threads available on the forums: one for this week’s questions and one for next week’s Q&A.

  BioWare publishes this week’s SWTOR community Q&A, preps for next week originally appeared on Massively on Sat, 21 Apr 2012 14:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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• EVE Online streamlines the process of figuring out who’s crippling your ship

  Hots Games
  

  Filed under: Sci-fi, EVE Online, Game mechanics, Patches, Previews, News items, Sandbox

  If you’re playing EVE Online, you are going to lose a ship sooner or later. It’s as inevitable as the tides. Sometimes you’ll be outnumbered and outgunned, and while that can be frustrating, there’s no real shame in it. But when you’re having your ship locked in place by an attacker you can’t see and you don’t actually know what’s happening, that is a different matter. It’s particularly infuriating, and it’s something that the game’s next update is aiming to fix.

  Starting with the next patch, the new Effects Bar will show a quick overview of all the effects currently in place on your ship as well as the source of same. So if there are two people attacking you, an icon will pop up, and you’ll be able to target and counterattack appropriately rather than fumble through more clumsy interface methods. If the blog entry explaining the system isn’t clear enough for you, check out the short preview video just past the break.

  Continue reading EVE Online streamlines the process of figuring out who’s crippling your ship

  EVE Online streamlines the process of figuring out who’s crippling your ship originally appeared on Massively on Wed, 18 Apr 2012 20:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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• Diablo III punches things up with a new Monk video and the end of beta

  Hots Games
  

  Filed under: Betas, Fantasy, Classes, Game mechanics, Previews, News items, Diablo III

  Diablo III is still putting together more previews as the game ramps up for its launch on May 15th. The latest reveal is for the Monk, a melee class that takes a very different approach from the already revealed Barbarian. Rather than attacking with massive weapons and overpowering rage, the Monk uses careful combo attacks, swift movements, and inner energy. Unleashing a Monk’s spiritual power after a long chain of melee attacks can produce all sorts of effects, from area damage to dashing out of combat quickly.

  This reveal coincides with the announcement that the Diablo III beta will be coming to a close on Tuesday, May 1st. Character information will be wiped at that time, and players will be able to post on the official forums only in the event that they have pre-purchased the game or they have an active account for another Blizzard game. If the Monk reveal makes you anxious to play one and you’re in the beta, you’d better get on that quickly or be prepared to wait for launch.

  Diablo III punches things up with a new Monk video and the end of beta originally appeared on Massively on Tue, 17 Apr 2012 20:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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• EVE Evolved: Fixing the wardec system

  Hots Games
  

  Filed under: Sci-fi, EVE Online, Expansions, Game mechanics, PvP, Opinion, EVE Evolved, Sandbox

  EVE Online‘s new Inferno expansion is almost here, bringing with it a massive PvP revamp. CCP will try to resurrect the dead faction warfare system, and new modules will be introduced to significantly shake up the PvP landscape for the first time in several years. The war declaration system is also getting a complete overhaul, with the goal of forcing the aggressor to commit to the war and making wars more structured and meaningful. Unfortunately, the implementation described at Fanfest doesn’t look like it will achieve that and doesn’t fix any of the system’s other problems.

  The attacking corp can no longer stop a war mid-week, and the defender can hire mercenaries to join his war, but this doesn’t add any risk for the attacking corp and doesn’t force it to commit. The attacker can always stop paying the war bill, and the war will then finish at the end of the week. As most empire wardecs are initiated by small shell corps full of PvP alts, the attacking players won’t mind logging out for a few days if the war backfires. The current war system is plagued with issues, from a complete lack of victory conditions to the fact that the attacker can pay for the war indefinitely. It allows bizarre asymmetries, like tiny alt corps declaring war on major military alliances, and offers no way for even the most militarily powerful defender to win the war.

  In this week’s EVE Evolved, I lay out some of the problems with EVE Online‘s upcoming wardec revamp and propose an alternative system that fixes them.

  Continue reading EVE Evolved: Fixing the wardec system

  EVE Evolved: Fixing the wardec system originally appeared on Massively on Sun, 15 Apr 2012 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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