Originally posted by TheeLord

Hello all, I and a few others have been working on a sandbox MMO for over three years now.  Decent progress has been made and it looks like it may become a reality in another few years.  I was just brainstorming today on some ideas and got to thinking...  I am going for a niche market, I need to get an even better idea what my market wants to play.  We are going for the market that darkfall and mortal let down, the player who wants EVE online in a more familiar fantasy setting, the player who loved UO, the player who appreciates a challenge, realism, and freedom over storyline and graphics, the player who is maybe creative and team orientated.

So, below are some of the large aspects of the game, if this brief outline sounds fun to you please help out and post some of your great gameplay ideas that would fit this type of game.  =)

 

-No premade cities, no premade missions etc... 

-Dynamic world, if you chop down a tree or kill a pack of wolves it will not respawn.  Threats will grow in the wilderness and eventually attack villages etc... if not dealt with.

-Players will be able to form factions together, control territory and setup rules for who can do what in their territory.

-Players can setup missions for eachother to gather resources, escort, defend, attack, and much more.

-Everything in the world will be created by players, all structures, weapons, roads, armor etc...  An upkeep system will be in place to prevent ghost towns.

-More well off players and factions can hire NPCs to do some tasks like defend (town, structure, road, ...), act as a vendor for your goods or missions, farm a field, and other more mundane tasks.

1.  Economy:  Raw materials only.  Everything in the world created by players is a start, but make sure full, useable loot doesn't magically spawn on an enemy.  Scraps that can be "salvaged" for parts, raw material spawns, all good.  Think in terms of Minecraft...

2.  Dynamic worlds can also be a mess.  Look at the problems Xsyon has had with theirs.  Make it so that things cease to exist, and sooner or later, the world becomes a barren wasteland.  Some kind of a regeneration needs to be built in, just like the natural cycle in the real world.  Creatures need to repopulate, palnts need to grow, etc.

3.  Skill system should have caps.  Not the 100% open sytstem Darkfall has that makes every character the same build by the end.  UO had the right system; a set # of points that can be slowly distributed by use or decay from lack of use, making characters dynamic and changing as needed for certain situations.

4.  PvP/Loot/Penalty... they all need to be addressed.  Dying needs to have a drawback to it.  Winning a battle needs to have a reward for it.  None of this should be set on "optional" flags or it just won't work.  It needs to be either all or nothing.

Originally posted by Maquiame

A word of advice, PVE only servers, at the end of the day your game needs to make money, please make at least one or two pve servers, these will be your biggest moneymakers- or at least have pve only zones (ahem good reason to put in those more diverse human starting areas/kingdoms I am speaking about). FFA pvp should either have its own areas or its own servers, if its prevalent throughout the game those douches will keep alot of your potential playing base away and you won't make as much money.

Oh and a good story and some questing- it should have some themepark elements for those new to this type of game, not alot, and the quests can be totally optional, but I would use these quests as a tutorial on how to play the game.

I hope the games story is good if you need help in designing aspects of the world story and its lore I don't mind helping at all.

This..^..Give PvE there own servers....just makes good business sense.  It hurts no one and keeps $$ in your pocket....

i

Originally posted by Zaush
You almost lost me at "more faimiliar fantasy setting", I prefer Sci Fi. I don't play EvE because I want to be a person not a ship, but I degrees. Love bullet point ideas. I would add. -Traditional RPG combat. No twitch/action. - A creature handling system similar to SWG pre cu. You roll that up in a nice package and could have me for years, even in a fantasy setting.

I was a creature handler pre cu...loved it....I would love to see that type of system again.

I am wanting to have creatures be tameable, some rideable, some domesticable for food/wool etc...  I will see if that system can make it in game or not, hopefully!

Originally posted by Sonictempal

Originally posted by Maquiame

A word of advice, PVE only servers, at the end of the day your game needs to make money, please make at least one or two pve servers, these will be your biggest moneymakers- or at least have pve only zones (ahem good reason to put in those more diverse human starting areas/kingdoms I am speaking about). FFA pvp should either have its own areas or its own servers, if its prevalent throughout the game those douches will keep alot of your potential playing base away and you won't make as much money.

Oh and a good story and some questing- it should have some themepark elements for those new to this type of game, not alot, and the quests can be totally optional, but I would use these quests as a tutorial on how to play the game.

I hope the games story is good if you need help in designing aspects of the world story and its lore I don't mind helping at all.

This..^..Give PvE there own servers....just makes good business sense.  It hurts no one and keeps $$ in your pocket....

That is a good idea, maybe have a few different servers with different rulesets, like really hardcore, more pve, etc...

Originally posted by TheeLord

I am wanting to have creatures be tameable, some rideable, some domesticable for food/wool etc...  I will see if that system can make it in game or not, hopefully!

If you have a real world with avatars and crap you can look at the A Tale in the Desert animal system, its really cool and fun. Animals have to be fed and they breed and they produce other products like dung and wool and crap.

Here is a more compelete explanation of features which I wroteup a while back on another site:

Complete Sandbox Gameplay

-Factions is acompletely different style of MMORPG. Where most MMOs follow the same tried and tested pattern of pre-made,story-driven content. Factions strives to provide a completely unique experience. An almost completely untapped game play style in the Fantasy MMO genre.

-Some "sandbox" games promise open-ended game play, only to be upset by the lack of essential sandbox features like the ones explained below. Factions strives to appeal to the niche gamer who craves a morerealistic open-ended fantasy MMO. It will not appeal to every joe schmo and their sister as other mass market games attempt to do.

-Factions allows the player to play whatever role they choose. Whether youare more interested in combat, crafting, faction and/or town management, building a business empire, or any combination of these things, you will be able to play how you want to.



Full featured faction system

-Traditional 'guilds'have been replaced with the 'factions' concept.

-Factions can control territory,build towns, and wage war against rival factions.

-Rules can be established to control how your faction is governed, how it interacts with other individuals and otherfactions, and how it handles infractions on its sovereignty.

-Factions (and even powerful and well developed individual players) can hire NPCs to perform duties around theirtowns. Manning a guard post, farming afield, providing vendor services for your goods, acting as an auctioneer for your town, and more can all be handled by NPCs. They will require upkeep in the form of pay and food from your fields.

-Borrowing concepts from RTS games and possibly even City-building games, buildings can be erected to serve purposes (silos for food storage, walls for defense, forges to melt the hardestmetals, mills to process the strongest of woods, machines to make mass quantities of the most mundane parts). Towns with the best infrastructure and resources will be the lifeblood and work-horses of well-off factions.



Fully dynamic world

-One world (oneshard) for all players, no portals to go through to reach other areas, no instancing, no static pre-made "theme park" destined to be the same experience for each player.

-Everything from the plant life to groups of monsters is generated in the world and evolves with theworld.

-If a tree is cut down, it will not grow back. If a monster is killed, itwill not respawn. If a mineral depositis mined, it will not return. etc... etc...

-Some threats will need to be dealt with before they become too big a threat. For example, if a faction's territory is on the edge of wilderness it will become necessary to wonder out into the wild to destroy gathering threats before they encroach on their lands. Saythat an ogre camp has been established deep in the woods, far outside the screaming distance of any man. The camp may start out with a single tent and a couple of ogres which are a nuisance to the local deer and rabbit population. In a few days they may establish a larger foothold, start a campfire, and erect a few more tents. Some more powerful ogreswill join them. Given a few weeks theymay be strong enough to send dozens of marauding warriors to bring back needed supplies to their foothold in the wilds; a small faction's town may be ill-prepared for such an invasion.



Completely player driven economy

-Nothing will have apre-set price in the game and all materials and products will be worth only what the buyer will pay.

-There are no gear vendors with gear that spawns out of thin air. If you see a NPC gear vendor, he is hired by a player or faction, told where to stand and who to sell to, and his stock is provided by that player or faction. Infact, if the vendor was killed, the stock could be looted.

-There is no 'starting area', as a new player you have the choice of starting in the wilderness alone, or starting in a faction that welcomes new players (you will be able to choose which of these factions to start in). When you first spawn, you will have only the rags on your back and a small bag, it will be up to you to work, adventure, beg, borrow, or steal to secure your spot in the world.

-There is still a missions system,with all missions being provided by the players. A small list of mission scenarios can befound below:

-Escort mission. A player may hire other players to escort him to a far away place to protect a cart full of expensive wares. Or a player may need protection while mininga large iron deposit far off in the wilderness. Or maybe the player just needs a player who has access to a larger wagon to haul his goods?

-Bounty mission. A player may decide to put a very large sumof money on an opponent's head. Or possibly a very valuable piece of armor was lost to an enemy in battle and the vanquished player will pay handsomely to have it returned to him.

-Collection mission. A wealthy player may need 50trees worth of lumber to complete his new house, he may decide to hire someoneelse to do the work so he can focus on obtaining the marble stone from a far away town... Or maybe he'll hire someoneto go pick that up for him as well?

-Kill count mission. The constant incursions from the local giant bear populations may be starting to effect the farm production,a player may be hired to kill 20 of them to stem the attacks.

-Production mission. The faction leadership maydemand a stone wall be erected around the town instead of the old wooden palisade. A player may request 500 bolts be produced.

-These are just some of the scenarios which may prompt a player or faction to post a mission. Missions can be posted on inexpensive boards in a faction's town, or can be left with an NPC.



Nearly everything is player created with a rich, deep crafting system

-Just about everything that would naturally need to have been created, has been created by a player. Gone are the days of finding a piece of armor dropping from an alligator or a snake-like monster with no arms wieldinga two-handed sword. Youwillfind, however, alligator bones on every alligator and snake skin on every snake.

-As mentioned previously, there areno pre-built cities or towns or buildings or NPCs. The entire world will be shaped by the player's actions.

-It is possible that a player may reach an extremely high skill level in a specific trade skill and may be able to create things only dreamed of by other players (think nearly one-of-a-kind items like an Excalibur sword).

-Most complex items will require many different skills to create. While it is possible that one player posses all these skills, it is very unlikely. Cooperation will be required to create items like buildings and armor/weapons of high quality.

-Mounts, pets, and companions willneed to be tamed or raised by someone skilled in such an art.

-Crafted items will not always turn out with the exact same specs. Forexample, if a sub-par lumberjack cuts down a tree and damages the wood, and then a sub-par Fletcher creates a "Longbow Arrow Shaft" from that lumber, it may provide a damage increase of +5. Whereas if a lumberjack cuts down a higher quality tree and then anexpert Fletcher uses that wood to create a "Longbow Arrow Shaft" it may provide a damage increase of +20.

-Town management will be a craft initself. To ensure efficient food production, building upkeep, and NPC management, the town management will needto keep a close eye on the workings of the town, faction, and its players.



Ability based skill system

-No one is tied downto any specific class any longer. Players will build their character to precisely what they envision by using Factions deep ability system.

-While more powerful abilities do have pre-requisites, for example, to be able to hurl a ball of fire at another player, you must first learn how to create magical fire and then learn how touse it against another player whom you can touch, then you may be able to learn how to project it distances.

-The ability system will allow very extreme combinations such as a marksman who can stealth or a plate armor healer. But these combinations would bein vastly different areas of the tech tree and would take a long time to obtain such terrific combinations.

-Each ability in the game has a skill level, so while your shield block ability may be available to you, it will take a very long time until it 100% effective.

-Abilities take time to acquire. Even while you are logged off of the game,you can continue accumulating points towards learning the ability of your choice.

-Abilities must be learned from other players with the exception of one ability per week which can be chosen by the player without having to learn it from another player.

-Trade skills and crafting will be included in this ability system. 

This sounds incredibly like a game I am making although I went even more sandbox and do not have the infrastructure to make a 3d or iso game world. It is the closest thing to my ideal game I have heard of, so if it ends up being released sign me up, I would love to play in the beta too.

We have placed up a small discussion forum to allow for people to get in touch with the dev team regarding Factions.  If you have suggestions, questions, concerns, or just want to talk about the game please register and post away!

http://factionsgame.proboards.com

You've been working for three years and you have nothing to show us, yet you expect to finish in three years?

Not wanting to be rude, but your timetable seems completely unrealistic and I smell another DF/MO in the works, with less to show than those games.

Good luck on your project, though. I will check back in three years.

Originally posted by tom_gore

You've been working for three years and you have nothing to show us, yet you expect to finish in three years?

Not wanting to be rude, but your timetable seems completely unrealistic and I smell another DF/MO in the works, with less to show than those games.

Good luck on your project, though. I will check back in three years.

Most of those 3 years was development by myself  =)  Understandably, people want to see you're serious before they will join your team on such an ambitious project.   Here are some screenshots of the current build.  All placeholder assets of course, but gives you an idea of just how far along we are.

Just a question, sorry if it has been answered already, or two...

Piracy? Is boat building something available? Ive never really done that in a game before, I would like to try it one day.

You mentioned that some player(s) will eventually be able to own land and set some rules as to who can do what... will any rule breaking from outsiders, thievery, be possible? Obviously that is something that would be difficult to even be able to do as a player, and then to get away with I would imagine, but would it be possible to RP as a thief? Not that I would do it...

Anyway, I would definitely love to try your game, if I am still around in three years or so...

Oh and after looking at my sig: How convienent would it be to trade with other people? Like, would we have to meet up face-to-face, or is it possible implement... something else. I would like to be a business tycoon.

sorry, my mind is a little jumbled at the moment.

Thanks for posting the screenshots. At least they show that you've got some kind of engine rolling and a rudimentary UI.

Which engine are you using by the way? Is it proprietary or licensed? Are you planning to use third-party technologies for the physics engine and/or graphical assets?

Originally posted by tom_gore

Thanks for posting the screenshots. At least they show that you've got some kind of engine rolling and a rudimentary UI.

 

Which engine are you using by the way? Is it proprietary or licensed? Are you planning to use third-party technologies for the physics engine and/or graphical assets?

 

The game uses DarkGDK for graphics which is licensed, but you only need to pay for it after you gross a certain amount.

There is no physics in game, graphical assets are being created by our team.  The final look will be more stylized then what is shown here. 

Hello all my name is Ray Crabtree and I'm the Art Director for Factions.  Just wanted to post a few images of wip models for everyone to take a look at.  Enjoy!

i dont c why ppl rag on Darkfall...im actually leaving SWTOR to go back to Darkfall....

Originally posted by asyndeton

Just a question, sorry if it has been answered already, or two...

 

Piracy? Is boat building something available? Ive never really done that in a game before, I would like to try it one day.

 

You mentioned that some player(s) will eventually be able to own land and set some rules as to who can do what... will any rule breaking from outsiders, thievery, be possible? Obviously that is something that would be difficult to even be able to do as a player, and then to get away with I would imagine, but would it be possible to RP as a thief? Not that I would do it...

 

Anyway, I would definitely love to try your game, if I am still around in three years or so...

 

Oh and after looking at my sig: How convienent would it be to trade with other people? Like, would we have to meet up face-to-face, or is it possible implement... something else. I would like to be a business tycoon.

 

sorry, my mind is a little jumbled at the moment.

In an effort to drive some of these discussions to the game forums, I have responded to this on our forums.  =)  Below is the URL of the thread:

http://factionsgame.proboards.com/index.cgi?action=display&board=general&thread=4&page=1

Originally posted by XxCrusaderxX

 

 

It's staring at us! D:

Honestly, as long as you can enter buildings, I'm fine with their designs. :<

Originally posted by Scypheroth

i dont c why ppl rag on Darkfall...im actually leaving SWTOR to go back to Darkfall....

Completely off-topic, but I'm watching Darkfall if it would one day become more about playing the game and less about grinding (macroing) skills 24/7.

I like the art style, in fact. Of course without textures can't say for sure yet, but the models look alright.

Good luck with the project. I'll be checking it out periodically :)