It is wonderful news that Cryptic is taking up the reigns of this massive IP for an MMORPG. So much potential is here! What worries me a tad is that they fall into a gaming system all too familiar. Player run ships. Earth and Beyond was one of the first MMO’s on the market that had players flying their own customized ships around taking out enemies and doing missions for money. The player avatar was simply a driver who went to ports and got rewards or picked up assigned missions. It was the thing that was assigned the stats and did the work.
Cryptic has an opportunity to revamp the whole concept of the ship is the central core to a space game. Let me explain:
The Cryptic Customization Touch
We all know Cryptic has revitalized customization of the avatar appearance and costumes in its CoH games.
Instead of a variety of costumes, Cryptic can try scaling stats for avatar creation. It should be noted that personal stats should not be the emphasis of the game. We are not hoping to deck out our avatars in silly armor or clothing because we want to maximize our hit points. However, there is nothing wrong with statistics of our avatar to aid us in our skills.
So stats are simply modifiers for players in how they perform. The game should still not let stats dictate the game. The players actions do. Stats should not be requirements for improved gear or ships
Everyone with some MMO experience has seen the incredible about of scaling one can do with his or her avatars? Make them taller, more muscled, skinny, bustier, chunky, ugly, etc. What if you had a stat bar to correlate with your changes? You want a muscled character? As you scroll his physique towards the max, his Strength and Constitution scores go up, but his intellect, wisdom and dexterity creeps down. Want a genius? His cranium might get bigger and more head details open up to you. (Pointy ears, frills, etc.), however, his constitution and strength will be capped lower. Want a Captain Kirk whose guile and handsomeness rule the stars? He won’t be as strong or hardy as a Klingon character.
I don't think the ship's or the character creation will be as big an issue as the gray area. Most of Cryptic's work has been cut and dry good vs evil mmo's, with star trek thats going to go out the window. Also with star trek we should see, though I doubt it will be done, the progression of players through star fleet academy and into fleet. Or what not depending on your race, the simple issue is I doubt it will be done like that.
I'll wait till I see more, I just don't want to see this become CoH in space.
Thu Aug 07 2008 2:15PMYeah, they should make it so if you're a Caucasian male, you can't jump or dance. If you're Chinese, you're a lousy driver and gold farmer. And if you're female, you're really good at cooking and housekeeping, but foul-tempered five days out of every month. /end sarcasm
Thu Aug 07 2008 6:14PMIn case you hadn't guessed, I'm not very fond of linking cosmetic choices to game mechanics. Most MMOs have plenty of avenues for min-max munchkins to obsess over. There's no need to include appearance and other role-playing aspects in their reindeer games.
That's a good point. If you tie stats into appearance, then we're just going to see a whole bunch of people with big brains and a whole bunch of people with god-like muscles. The min-maxers aren't going to care about this, but those of us that actually have taste and actually like the Star Trek universe are gonna be stuck looking at other people's awful avatars.
Thu Aug 07 2008 7:38PMI wouldn't go into making a giant head just like the CoH customization doesn't allow such extremes in their games already. I would have a drop down menu that expands head details if the person wanted an intellect. Things like noticeable veins at the temples, a deep brow, larger eyes, etc.
As far as the ones who want a strong avatar, again the City of Series gives you a Huge build template already. No need to make them ridiculous.
I am not sure that hanshotfirst thought I meant appearance scaling with stats should lead to some bad stereotype behaviors. If he took it that way, ummmm. Sorry?
All I was thinking was to have an avatar a side bar linked to numbers which could be linked to the avatar statistics. How do stats translate into women that are foul tempered five days a month? Make a female avatar. Want her to be tall, agile, and intelligent? Make it so! Want her to be husky, homely yet cunning? Done! Want her to be a clone like 100 other character models on your server like every other MMO? Then thanks for reading...
Thu Aug 07 2008 8:39PMYour proposal is based on stereotypes. Big, athletic guys are dumb for example. You're suggesting that physical appearance dictate ability.
Thu Aug 07 2008 11:18PMGene Roddenberry would be rolling in his grave.
The appearance being tied to intelligence would explicitly NOT work for Star Trek, because of the number of aliens. Why would aliens all have the same physiology that we do? Vulcans are supposedly pretty smart, but they're also stronger than humans as I recall. I don't think I ever saw a yoked out, muscular Vulcan in any of the shows.
Thu Aug 07 2008 11:32PMGood point Ujaya -
If we were able to play other races othan Humans and Klingons then I wholeheartedly agree.
@hanshotfirst -
The scale is merely a balance to prevent us all from rolling superhumans- maximize one area and another area is diminished. My strength - intelligence min/ max example is just that, an example.
Remember we are only allowed to roll humans and klingons at this point ( i would love to roll a Vulcan, Ferengi, Cardassian, etc.). So we are limited in that regard. Good stuff all. Keep the ideas rolling. We all want the same thing - for STO to rock!
Fri Aug 08 2008 7:35AMMMORPG.com writes:
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