Developers Corner

Sometimes I wonder, what am I doing?

I blather out design notes from time to time, look at them and say it is good, and so it is, but I know it is not so.

What I am trying to create is uncreateable, yet is right in front of me.  Essentually trying to place my thoughts onto paper.  As if the communication of ideas in writting or drawing wasn't hard enough, I am trying to place it into a medium of code that could potentially be played by 1,000 people at the same time.

The problem is that I, like I would wager most people do, think in instances.  Not the dungeon types but in single situations.  As a player I only experience things in instances, I do not have an over view of the world.  While I can evaluate any design objectively, it is my subjective view that gives it meaning and makes it fun. 

So I think whenever someone says FFA PvP is fun they are doing so because they are thinking of a specfic situation that they imagine FFA PvP in, since this imagined event is interesting they apply this feeling to the entire concept, but there is no way to make all FFA PvP encounters have the same quality as the imagined event.

I could study what people liked about certain MMOGs and form a design around that, but that is not art to me.  My artistic side and my logical side are at odds,  one reminds me of the limitations of technology and manpower, while the other urges that without a perfect rendition it is ruined.  I cannot reign my ideas into a single concept, like I said I think in instances, I cannot just create a list of features and be done with it.

When I think what I want to do in a MMOG I think of specific actions.  If you were to ask me I would not say, participate in world PvP, I would say that I would be waiting in a bar smoking a cigarette when a man walks in, who happens to have a bounty on him.  I could also describe how my character looks, how the bar looks, the music and the lights.  This is how I detrive my features, like I guess most people do.  The situation in another setting and another context would lose its meaning and not be as fun.  So the problem becomes adding a bounty system, not that it can't be done but I have no way to communicate the details of what made me interested in such a system in the first place.  In reality most likely players would just run around find the bountyhead and kill him.

I do not want to chase bounties for the sake of doing it, it is the feeling I would get from being a bounty hunter and living the life of a bounty hunter, smoky bars, digging up information in a back ally, the criminals, the dialog, it is the specifics that create the experience.  Every feature has had an instance or instances of thought in my head that spurred the creation of that possible feature.  But practically speaking it is impossible to convey that much depth of meaning and such a visceral experience to MMOG players, I cannot control the circumstances of the people playing, if I could guide every player personally through my own imagination I would.  You can do this for single player games where they can only follow the developer's lead.  But in a MMOG you can't.

  I either have quests letting people experience my story and ideas, but then online they are confronted with the fact that they are doing the same things as everyone else, and it no longer seems special.  How do you give the players freedom but maintain the finely crafted feel to be present in all circumstances and situations?  Even suposing I could convey such a thing, meaning is subjective, the player imposes his own meaning to any instance and could derail from my original intent.

It is difficult enough to properly express a single character correctly much less an entire interactive world populated by 1,000 people. 

To convey my ideas I need to guide the player and show him the world but at the same time I do not want to control them, their experience is their own, such is the fun in MMOGs,  yet I wish it could maintain the calibur of my imagination.  Some non existant area between a movie and a sandbox game, between passive and interactive.

When reality and imagination clash, reality will eventually win, that just happens to make imagination sad :( 

So anyone else ever thought this way :P

Not really.

When I think about a feature, I always ask myself: Would it make peoples quit the game?  Would it make peoples play the game longer?

See, a FFA PvP server is definitely a good idea, anyone saying that not even 1 server is worth that...well, you are happy to crush someone else hopes.  FFA PvP is appealing to some players.  Arguably not many, but I am sure WoW would have to maintain more than 1 such server if they would apply the rules for it.

The main problem is that these devs, they don't play the game and they try to get a wrap-up.  All-in-one solution.  So naturally, they make poor choices on their already oversimplified setting.

It is better to feature no raiding at all, then poor thinked raiding.  Players have proven to be loyal to a game which has no raiding rewards whatsoever. (CoH).  But that is not how a simplistic analyzis view the situation.  A simplified analysis would say that more players will raid then peoples would actually quit the game in the short term.  This analysis doesn't go into the details of what are the long term impacts of the players leaving and those staying.  It doesn't say that raiding will continue to make peoples quit the game on a regular basic (such as a dot) without attracting many new players to the game specifically for the raiding components.  As a result, raiding will cause more peoples to leave in the long run, then it will even entertain.  Also, this raiding make peoples who PUG leave.  With less PUGers, a server lose interest dramatically to everyone else on the server, even peoples who dislike PUGs and scorn at them, like to do PUGs if they can't find guilds groups.

Creativity is not the problematic here.  A lack of proper analysis of each creative idea and if it is possible or not to implement it is the problem here.  FFA PvP wouldn't be a good idea for most MMOs out there, but for WoW, having 1 server with these feature would be extremely good (not that WoW needs any help), and would most likely leads to the creation of a few other.  Or maybe the FFA status on this server could vary with the phase of the moon.  I mean, FFA PvP is not appealing to me in the least and I would never play on such a server myself.  But, I don't hunt it down.  As long as you limit it to 1 server, and maybe even applied some twist to it (only during the night for example), I think it would be possible and to the taste of SOME players.

It may sound strange to you, but I find many fans of FFA PvP more open minded and nice then some other.  Many RvR and Raiding fans are the most dull peoples to talk with usually, as they are spoiled children used to get everything and, they are not thinking any compromise is acceptable on any server.  It must ALL be for them, everywhere.  As if I would even consider playing on their server, but point is, I rather play PONG then PvP or Raid.  FFA PvPers, the overwhelming majority of them, they only ask for 1 server to screw around.  It is not like it require heavy coding changes...and if the server isn't popular enought, after the player CHOOSE not to play, you can close it and transfer players to another server.  Apologizing but saying that the amount of players on this server was the decision of the community to not support this server, and you could even leave a note that if server C (the worst settting) ever reach a population of X players online, you would do a poll to re-open it.  That way, every player feel you actually care and listen to what they want.

See, if you create a raid-free server in a game with all raid-loot on 1 merchant (that is not requiring much effort, a few hours from 1 programmer as you don't need to remove anything, just put loot on 1 merchant).  If the population of this server is too low and you close it later on, even if I hate raiding, I would consider staying, the choice was the community choice.  If the population is soo big that you freaking have to open 12 more raid-free server, than I see no reason to complain from the devs but to freaking comply.  (In the case of WAR it would be 1 merchant with the best PvP/Raid loot, both of these).  The prices would have to be "low enought" that it is a much more viable way to earn these items then raiding (or PvP for WAR), but it could be adjusted afterward, as you see players storming this server...or not.

It is often the fear of the devs to lose us, that cause them to lose us.  They create something dull, boring, painfull, or just plainly bad, to keep us occupied, and we leave angry.  Keeping the players, must be done positively, not by struggle.  You can only lose at a struggle in a long run in entertainment.

dude you wrote a hella long post.... My attention span is short so if I miss it dont worry ill probably be back later to add more detail...

[quote]Originally posted by CactusmanX
[b]Sometimes I wonder, what am I doing?
I blather out design notes from time to time, look at them and say it is good, and so it is, but I know it is not so.
What I am trying to create is uncreateable, yet is right in front of me.  Essentually trying to place my thoughts onto paper.  As if the communication of ideas in writting or drawing wasn't hard enough, I am trying to place it into a medium of code that could potentially be played by 1,000 people at the same time.
The problem is that I, like I would wager most people do, think in instances.  Not the dungeon types but in single situations.  As a player I only experience things in instances, I do not have an over view of the world.  While I can evaluate any design objectively, it is my subjective view that gives it meaning and makes it fun. 
So I think whenever someone says FFA PvP is fun they are doing so because they are thinking of a specfic situation that they imagine FFA PvP in, since this imagined event is interesting they apply this feeling to the entire concept, but there is no way to make all FFA PvP encounters have the same quality as the imagined event.
[/quote]

It depends. Ask me if you want details but I think that is not the point of your post.

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I could study what people liked about certain MMOGs and form a design around that, but that is not art to me.  My artistic side and my logical side are at odds,  one reminds me of the limitations of technology and manpower, while the other urges that without a perfect rendition it is ruined.  I cannot reign my ideas into a single concept, like I said I think in instances, I cannot just create a list of features and be done with it.

---

Yeah same here. At home I just work on game code for fun and come up with a million ideas. It is not possible to combine my ideas into 1.

But if I did something I'd try to simplify my ideas as much as possible to something doable

---

When I think what I want to do in a MMOG I think of specific actions.  If you were to ask me I would not say, participate in world PvP, I would say that I would be waiting in a bar smoking a cigarette when a man walks in, who happens to have a bounty on him.  I could also describe how my character looks, how the bar looks, the music and the lights.  This is how I detrive my features, like I guess most people do.  The situation in another setting and another context would lose its meaning and not be as fun.  So the problem becomes adding a bounty system, not that it can't be done but I have no way to communicate the details of what made me interested in such a system in the first place.  In reality most likely players would just run around find the bountyhead and kill him.
I do not want to chase bounties for the sake of doing it, it is the feeling I would get from being a bounty hunter and living the life of a bounty hunter, smoky bars, digging up information in a back ally, the criminals, the dialog, it is the specifics that create the experience.  Every feature has had an instance or instances of thought in my head that spurred the creation of that possible feature.  But practically speaking it is impossible to convey that much depth of meaning and such a visceral experience to MMOG players, I cannot control the circumstances of the people playing, if I could guide every player personally through my own imagination I would.  You can do this for single player games where they can only follow the developer's lead.  But in a MMOG you can't.

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Yeah in mmorpgs they are normally player driven. You could supply the tools like the bounty system and tracking. Experiment and see what the 'rats' in the maze do (the players)> I would simply expect the absolute worse and place boundaries at appropriate places

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  I either have quests letting people experience my story and ideas, but then online they are confronted with the fact that they are doing the same things as everyone else, and it no longer seems special.  How do you give the players freedom but maintain the finely crafted feel to be present in all circumstances and situations?

---

not clear what you mean. But I'm assuming you are question how to make the experiences unique and not feel 'fake' like mmorpgs are now. One solution is pursue a coop RPG. Another, pursue dynamic mission generation. So, during every few cycles scan the areas where players are and craft scenarios for them. Then it will not feel fake. It is very doable to run a task every few seconds to generate these events.

[quote]
  Even suposing I could convey such a thing, meaning is subjective, the player imposes his own meaning to any instance and could derail from my original intent.
It is difficult enough to properly express a single character correctly much less an entire interactive world populated by 1,000 people. 
To convey my ideas I need to guide the player and show him the world but at the same time I do not want to control them, their experience is their own, such is the fun in MMOGs,  yet I wish it could maintain the calibur of my imagination.  Some non existant area between a movie and a sandbox game, between passive and interactive.
When reality and imagination clash, reality will eventually win, that just happens to make imagination sad :( 
So anyone else ever thought this way :P[/b][/quote]

not sure what you mean at all here :(

Originally posted by CactusmanX

Sometimes I wonder, what am I doing?

I blather out design notes from time to time, look at them and say it is good, and so it is, but I know it is not so.

What I am trying to create is uncreateable, yet is right in front of me.  Essentually trying to place my thoughts onto paper.  As if the communication of ideas in writting or drawing wasn't hard enough, I am trying to place it into a medium of code that could potentially be played by 1,000 people at the same time.

The problem is that I, like I would wager most people do, think in instances.  Not the dungeon types but in single situations.  As a player I only experience things in instances, I do not have an over view of the world.  While I can evaluate any design objectively, it is my subjective view that gives it meaning and makes it fun.

There is nothing wrong with your own subjective view on a system design in instances.  No one, and I mean no one, not even the present developers can figure out ALL possible instances their system would or wouldn't work.  That is why we have the appearance of FOTM.  The developers didn't meant to create such builds/classes, but it is there due to the fact that they didn't think of ALL possibility.  The developers think of what the system should function, not what the system would do if and when players use it differently.

So I think whenever someone says FFA PvP is fun they are doing so because they are thinking of a specfic situation that they imagine FFA PvP in, since this imagined event is interesting they apply this feeling to the entire concept, but there is no way to make all FFA PvP encounters have the same quality as the imagined event.

I could study what people liked about certain MMOGs and form a design around that, but that is not art to me.  My artistic side and my logical side are at odds,  one reminds me of the limitations of technology and manpower, while the other urges that without a perfect rendition it is ruined.  I cannot reign my ideas into a single concept, like I said I think in instances, I cannot just create a list of features and be done with it.

When I think what I want to do in a MMOG I think of specific actions.  If you were to ask me I would not say, participate in world PvP, I would say that I would be waiting in a bar smoking a cigarette when a man walks in, who happens to have a bounty on him.  I could also describe how my character looks, how the bar looks, the music and the lights.  This is how I detrive my features, like I guess most people do.  The situation in another setting and another context would lose its meaning and not be as fun.  So the problem becomes adding a bounty system, not that it can't be done but I have no way to communicate the details of what made me interested in such a system in the first place.  In reality most likely players would just run around find the bountyhead and kill him.

It sounds like you are more of a story-teller/writer/designer than the actual game system designer.  That actually is what many of the game studios are missing, especially in the MMORPG department - someone to write a story where the players can be pulled into the game, and feel like their character is there in that world.

I do not want to chase bounties for the sake of doing it, it is the feeling I would get from being a bounty hunter and living the life of a bounty hunter, smoky bars, digging up information in a back ally, the criminals, the dialog, it is the specifics that create the experience.  Every feature has had an instance or instances of thought in my head that spurred the creation of that possible feature.  But practically speaking it is impossible to convey that much depth of meaning and such a visceral experience to MMOG players, I cannot control the circumstances of the people playing, if I could guide every player personally through my own imagination I would.  You can do this for single player games where they can only follow the developer's lead.  But in a MMOG you can't.

 I either have quests letting people experience my story and ideas, but then online they are confronted with the fact that they are doing the same things as everyone else, and it no longer seems special.  How do you give the players freedom but maintain the finely crafted feel to be present in all circumstances and situations?  Even suposing I could convey such a thing, meaning is subjective, the player imposes his own meaning to any instance and could derail from my original intent.

It isn't easy to design a dynamic quest/task/mission system.  Even myself had to work on that for quite a while.  But eventually I used something that I read - online fantasy novel (in Chinese) to find that idea.  There are many ideas exist such as a large list of pre-made quests that the players will unlock or to generate randomly, there is the more social game where quests aren't the main point in the story, but letting the players to create their own stories are...

It is difficult enough to properly express a single character correctly much less an entire interactive world populated by 1,000 people. 

To convey my ideas I need to guide the player and show him the world but at the same time I do not want to control them, their experience is their own, such is the fun in MMOGs,  yet I wish it could maintain the calibur of my imagination.  Some non existant area between a movie and a sandbox game, between passive and interactive.

It really depends on your direction.  Take my own design for example, I would focus on having a really good background story, and I would let the players to have ways to follow in the story (a dynamic, moving time-line).  So in this case, my new contents are actually the continuation of the story, and how players can participate without break away from the virtual-world feel of the game.

When reality and imagination clash, reality will eventually win, that just happens to make imagination sad :( 

So anyone else ever thought this way :P

Sometimes I might have thoughts like that, but then I just look at what I already written down, and see how I can expand it to fit the grand picture.  It's like pieces of a large puzzle, you may come up with one idea (or an instance where something should work this way), find that place and put the piece in, and when you come up with the next piece, put it in.  After a while, you will see a bigger picture, and your design will be more solid.

I'm responding just to the OP.  I haven't read the other replies yet.

CactusmanX, I understand what you are saying.  I would say that the thing you have come up against is the difference between writing a novel and writing the rules for a game.

In a novel, or just oral storytelling, you can create specific situations that give a vague overall sense of the world they take place in.

But in game design you have to create the overall design (the rules of the world) very specifically and hope that it will generate the specific situations.

If you are writing a novel it's very easy to give a vague sense of the world and let the reader's imagination fill in the blanks.  Not so in game design.  In game design you have to deal with the nuts and bolts details of how things work, how things can be abused, how your rules will shape player behavior and so on.

I would say that you are in love with ideas and the feeling/sense of your imaginary world(s).  The problem you have encountered is that you can't focus on specific scenerios when developing rules.  You have to focus on the big picture, trying to take into account all factors, and hope that you can create a world that doesn't just allow specific scenerios similar to what you imagine but inevitably leads to them because of the way your overall game design works.

Using the specific example you described about hanging out in a bar when man with a bounty walks in:  As a game designer you would have to ask yourself why players would be hanging out in a bar in the first place.  The truth is that most people in mmorpgs don't do anything without a reason.  If there is no reason for them to hang out in a bar then the situation you describe would probably never happen.  That's the first hurdle you would have to overcome just to make that one little scenerio come to life.

Of course I'm just a monday morning quarterback because I myself have never made an online game.  The closest I've come is that I used to GM tabletop games and developed my own set of rules for that, which is hardly the same thing.  But I have spent ridiculous amounts of time thinking about this stuff.  Kind of sad really.