Originally posted by zazz  

Pencilnick ur write on the money but for torik what ya on about man lmao? , give us a few examples then how this would work, challange without risk......

I Want to Be The Guy is basically an 8-bit Mario clone.  Dying restarts you from your last save, which might cost you anywhere from 3-60 seconds of gameplay (not actually sure of the upper end, but that sounds about right.)  Despite death barely costing you anything, the game is extremely challenging, and unless you're extremely good there's no way you're going to make it through on the hardest difficulty.

So like others are saying, challenge is largely separate from risk.

Here's another way of looking at it:

• Challenge describes how likely you are to fail (how much skill you need to succeed.)
• Risk/penalty describes what happens if you fail.

When put that way, Time Consumption doesn't really make you more likely to fail.  It merely makes things more painful when you do fail.

Originally posted by Inzra

I picked up a trial for an mmo, and the game isn't any worse than alot of others.

But I now find myself in an area I don't really know the name of, doing a quest that I haven't read and come to thnk of it I don't even know the title of.

All I did was go to someone with a certain symbol over his head, which means he's an NPC with something to offer.

i clicked on one of the texts and a long text appeared, meaning it's a quest. And sure at the bottom there is the well knwn "accept" "deny" option. I accept knowing that quests tend to do leveling up more fun and perhaps faster since pure grind is boring and makes you want to logoff.

Some arrow pops up in the minimap and of we go. When I get to the quest area, there is something shining, or blinking, or sparkling, all I have to do is pick it up. Sometimes its a monster - kill X amount of... but I don't need to read the quest cause the questtracker say " Y amount killed / X amount to go"

So here I am in the middle of nowhere looking at some sparkly things, bushes this time it seems. Guess it's a collect berry quest.

 

This is why easymode Imo diminish the game experience - yes I know I can read the quest description and all the names and everything. But people usually take up the path of least resistance. And although reading through a quest can be boring, the times I find myself have to doing so, I actually feel more immersed in what's going on.

Btw, voiceovers for quests doesn't help, becase if you can skip them and use a quest helper/  tracker instead, alot of people will skip it.

 

So what is your solution?

Originally posted by Inzra

I picked up a trial for an mmo, and the game isn't any worse than alot of others.

But I now find myself in an area I don't really know the name of, doing a quest that I haven't read and come to thnk of it I don't even know the title of.

All I did was go to someone with a certain symbol over his head, which means he's an NPC with something to offer.

i clicked on one of the texts and a long text appeared, meaning it's a quest. And sure at the bottom there is the well knwn "accept" "deny" option. I accept knowing that quests tend to do leveling up more fun and perhaps faster since pure grind is boring and makes you want to logoff.

Some arrow pops up in the minimap and of we go. When I get to the quest area, there is something shining, or blinking, or sparkling, all I have to do is pick it up. Sometimes its a monster - kill X amount of... but I don't need to read the quest cause the questtracker say " Y amount killed / X amount to go"

So here I am in the middle of nowhere looking at some sparkly things, bushes this time it seems. Guess it's a collect berry quest.

 

This is why easymode Imo diminish the game experience - yes I know I can read the quest description and all the names and everything. But people usually take up the path of least resistance. And although reading through a quest can be boring, the times I find myself have to doing so, I actually feel more immersed in what's going on.

Btw, voiceovers for quests doesn't help, becase if you can skip them and use a quest helper/  tracker instead, alot of people will skip it.

 

And this matters, why? Let the hack 'n slash have their fun and you have yours.

Originally posted by Jairoe03

Honestly, how many "different" things can you do with a theme-park that revolves around combat in regards to encounters. There's only so much you can do in terms of absolute good designs and they can't just haphazardly throw any type of encounter in because "diddy hasn't done it before". Its funny to see people complain about not having enough challenges or new experiences but these are the same people that most likely cannot even come up with new and original encounters that'll be sufficient enough to even entertain themselves. Everything listed in the above post has been done already in WoW, again how much new, quality encounters can you make within a game before you have to re-use particular concepts?

In terms of challenge, have you ever played some of the older MMORPGs like Everquest or DAoC with those death penalties? It's not necessarily the best thing to provide a high risk, it all is dependent on the design of the game. WoW focuses around providing fun and experiences to as many people as there are purchasing their game and it is designed as such. If a particular MMO isn't satisfying you in terms of challenge, then its best to find another, but you better not complain about it being too hard when you get there ;)

I think you're slightly misunderstanding "more challenge." We're not asking for more (quantity) content (well we are, but not in this thread.)

We're asking for more challenge!  Challenge = difficulty.  We want things to be hard.

And like my other post explained, penalty/risks don't make a game harder.  They only make it more time consuming, tedious, or less fun.

As Torik explained, you need exactly as much death penalty as is necessary for gameplay purposes (and to communicate to the player, "hey you screwed up"), and no more.  Anything beyond that is excessive and simply ruins the fun.

Originally posted by Axehilt

I think you're slightly misunderstanding "more challenge." We're not asking for more (quantity) content (well we are, but not in this thread.)

We're asking for more challenge!  Challenge = difficulty.  We want things to be hard.

And like my other post explained, penalty/risks don't make a game harder.  They only make it more time consuming, tedious, or less fun.

As Torik explained, you need exactly as much death penalty as is necessary for gameplay purposes (and to communicate to the player, "hey you screwed up"), and no more.  Anything beyond that is excessive and simply ruins the fun.

I don't agree about the death penalty. Lineage had the best one in my opinion, you lost some experience points and sometimes you also lost a random item (which your buddies could pick up for you, or if you wiped, a random monster would and add it to his loot). Death penalty should be something that actually hurts even if not as much as a corpserun. Dying should be bad, in AoC did people even die on purpose before to use it as a teleporting mechanics.

But yes, games should be harder. You should actually be proud when you reach max level, it shouldn't be something anyone can do in a few weeks. and group content should be harder then solocontent. In many games now it is the other way around.

I want to be challenged when I am playing. I don't mind that there is games for kids that is easier but I don't like where you just sit and push buttons without even bothering to think and still beat the boss.

I also don't like the whole tank, DPS, buff and healer system, it just makes things too easy. Guildwars aggro system is a lot better. Mobs should act more like real humans, you don't tank anyone in PvP. The AI of other game-genres is a lot better today but we are still in EQ with the MMOs.

Originally posted by Zorndorf

2 dilemma's here to think about all you "knowing it better" people.

 

1. ------- > The bigger the chances of win ... the bigger the chances of finding groups to play with.

And MMO's .... thrive on playing with people (in dunegons/raids/PvP fights) in co-op modes besides of the choices of solo play and crafting etc...

2. -------> Challenge can also come from competition. Pure adrenaline competition. Winning that fight to CLIMB up the ladder based PVP competition.

I have seen grown up men to smash their mouses against the wall and (God!) monitors when they lost a rated fight in WOW's arena.

So think about challenge and easy mode first before being baffled why WOW offers it BOTH.

 

Yeah, WoW offers challenge but in a far lesser way than it did in BC and old Naxx. There are 3-4 hard hardmodes at the moment, bar TOTC.
If you can't agree with that, then you are wrong.

I for one DESPISE HAND HOLDING technology in MMORPGs!

Many of them come off like:

"Here, take this quest, we'll show you where to go, and what to kill (it will be easy), and then when you turn the quest in, you get L33T bragging rights, a big e-peen, and a cookie".

Their advertising should look like: "You too can be a LEVEL 99 UBER-WARGOD in 10 easy steps.  No thinking required."

Bah!

Ken

Originally posted by Loke666

I don't agree about the death penalty. Lineage had the best one in my opinion, you lost some experience points and sometimes you also lost a random item (which your buddies could pick up for you, or if you wiped, a random monster would and add it to his loot). Death penalty should be something that actually hurts even if not as much as a corpserun. Dying should be bad, in AoC did people even die on purpose before to use it as a teleporting mechanics.

But yes, games should be harder. You should actually be proud when you reach max level, it shouldn't be something anyone can do in a few weeks. and group content should be harder then solocontent. In many games now it is the other way around.

I want to be challenged when I am playing. I don't mind that there is games for kids that is easier but I don't like where you just sit and push buttons without even bothering to think and still beat the boss.

I also don't like the whole tank, DPS, buff and healer system, it just makes things too easy. Guildwars aggro system is a lot better. Mobs should act more like real humans, you don't tank anyone in PvP. The AI of other game-genres is a lot better today but we are still in EQ with the MMOs.

Dying is bad, even in MMOs where the penalty is "light".  Even in other genres where MMORPGers would describe the game as having "no" penalty, dying is bad.

Dying used as teleporting is a two-fold problem of ensuring the game has robust enough fast travel, and ensuring death costs more gold than you could farm in the time you saved by death-teleporting.  Or kill two birds with one stone and just give players a Recall ability that lets them teleport to the nearest respawn point (because most of what players have a problem with is the idea that they're killing their character to teleport around, not that they can teleport around.)

DPS, Buffing, and Healing will always be around.  It's a role-playing game.  It's going to have roles.  You're probably going to kill things, so one role will be DPS.  The easiest game mechanic to add after that is healing, so one role is probably going to be healing.  And since you're trying to differentiate the roles, you make one role Support (buffing): someone whose DPS isn't that great, but whose contribution to the team makes the team's net DPS greater than if he was just another DPSer.

The "expendible" role here is tanking.  I'm neutral on tanking.  I want to see people take a stab at making something new, but I also recognize that it's a fun game mechanic.  It's understandable to players and the better games make it a game unto itself, and it's fun to learn the tricks to manipulating the mob AI.   It's sort of a concession of developers that, "We know you're going to exploit our mobs' AI, and we know you know it's just AI, so let's turn it into its own game instead!"

Healing I could also see taken in interesting directions. I think a game could exist with no healing classes, and no automatic health recovery inside instances.  Playing DDO a few months back, it struck me how their dungeons provided a finite amount of Rest Shrines and that was all the health you got to make it through the entire dungeon.

I think the design could be significantly improved by having incoming damage be more controllable via playerskill, and having mob kills occasionally drop health packs.  So unlike DDO you wouldn't get into a situation where you knew your piddly 5 hp wasn't going to be enough to get you through the last 25% of the dungeon, and you may as well give up/reset because you're toast.  But the gameplay of such a game would be a lot more playerskill-centric than normal MMORPGs, because you'd want to make it a true feat of skill for players to get through that final 25% of the dungeon when they were at 5hp at one point.

Originally posted by Zorndorf

Originally posted by Thenarius

Originally posted by Zorndorf

2 dilemma's here to think about all you "knowing it better" people.

 

1. ------- > The bigger the chances of win ... the bigger the chances of finding groups to play with.

And MMO's .... thrive on playing with people (in dunegons/raids/PvP fights) in co-op modes besides of the choices of solo play and crafting etc...

2. -------> Challenge can also come from competition. Pure adrenaline competition. Winning that fight to CLIMB up the ladder based PVP competition.

I have seen grown up men to smash their mouses against the wall and (God!) monitors when they lost a rated fight in WOW's arena.

So think about challenge and easy mode first before being baffled why WOW offers it BOTH.

 

Yeah, WoW offers challenge but in a far lesser way than it did in BC and old Naxx. There are 3-4 hard hardmodes at the moment, bar TOTC.
If you can't agree with that, then you are wrong.

I think Blizzard was VERY smart in inviting everyone to do Raids in WotLK.
 

The same goes now for the Heroics in patch 3.2.. It was so much played, they had huge population problems with their dungeon system.

You offer MORE group play by offering SCALING in difficulty. Like it or not and it is ALWAYS a question of being happy to play WITH people.

The battle stress in Arena is excellent and it shows the challenge of getting a title NEAR your limited capacity. Not everyone is Carl Lewis but at 54 I am PROUD of being a Challenger (prouder than having downed Onyxia back in the day).

That's why SCALED difficulty is incredible succesful IN game . Not in the bragging and lying forums of course.

Easy mode for you may be VERY challeging for another person.

And Blizzard offers it in .... scales.

Beautiful mechanic.

 

All I want is to make normal modes just a little bit harder. Remember Ulduar 25 normal-modes before Blizzard nerfed them and buffed hard modes? Exactly like that.  I don't expect Kael or Vashj pre-nerfs. Raids are fine to be done by more people, but "[2.Trade][Randomdude] LF 12 more DPS for TOTC 25, link Ulduar 25, Naxx and Epic achivs, 3 bosses left" irritates me.

Although, if Blizzard pulled a series of Sunwell-difficulty dungeons in WOTLK, people on this forums would have probably complained about them being too hard lol.
 

Originally posted by RealmLords

I for one DESPISE HAND HOLDING technology in MMORPGs!

Many of them come off like:

"Here, take this quest, we'll show you where to go, and what to kill (it will be easy), and then when you turn the quest in, you get L33T bragging rights, a big e-peen, and a cookie".

Their advertising should look like: "You too can be a LEVEL 99 UBER-WARGOD in 10 easy steps.  No thinking required."

Bah!

 Ken 

Neither Chess nor Go are "easy" games simply because their rules are easy to learn.

Accessibility + Game Depth = Fun

A Chess program which shows you all potential spaces your pieces could move would not be making the game less deep/strategic, much like a Quest or Minimap showing you potential places you could go in an MMORPG doesn't necessarily make the game any easier when you get there and have to fight some stuff.

Originally posted by RealmLords

I for one DESPISE HAND HOLDING technology in MMORPGs!

Many of them come off like:

"Here, take this quest, we'll show you where to go, and what to kill (it will be easy), and then when you turn the quest in, you get L33T bragging rights, a big e-peen, and a cookie".

Their advertising should look like: "You too can be a LEVEL 99 UBER-WARGOD in 10 easy steps.  No thinking required."

It's going to happen whether you like it or not, if not in the game, people are just going to go to the web and get FAQs and walkthroughs of all of the quests.  Like a lot of people have already pointed out, getting to the quest isn't the fun part, actually performing it is.

I think alot of us including myself  , got away from the topic of the thread whics is 'immersion'.

and things like minimaps, arrows, floating symbols, makes it more conventient yes,

and removing them might not make the game all that much 'harder' to play,

but I do think it would help make you more immersed in the gameworld, the setting.

Immersion guys, immersion

Originally posted by Inzra

I think alot of us including myself  , got away from the topic of the thread whics is 'immersion'.

and things like minimaps, arrows, floating symbols, makes it more conventient yes,

and removing them might not make the game all that much 'harder' to play,

but I do think it would help make you more immersed in the gameworld, the setting.

Immersion guys, immersion

For most, it would just force to Alt+TAB to Google.
Well, I admit it.

Originally posted by Inzra

I picked up a trial for an mmo, and the game isn't any worse than alot of others.

But I now find myself in an area I don't really know the name of, doing a quest that I haven't read and come to thnk of it I don't even know the title of.

All I did was go to someone with a certain symbol over his head, which means he's an NPC with something to offer.

i clicked on one of the texts and a long text appeared, meaning it's a quest. And sure at the bottom there is the well knwn "accept" "deny" option. I accept knowing that quests tend to do leveling up more fun and perhaps faster since pure grind is boring and makes you want to logoff.

Some arrow pops up in the minimap and of we go. When I get to the quest area, there is something shining, or blinking, or sparkling, all I have to do is pick it up. Sometimes its a monster - kill X amount of... but I don't need to read the quest cause the questtracker say " Y amount killed / X amount to go"

So here I am in the middle of nowhere looking at some sparkly things, bushes this time it seems. Guess it's a collect berry quest.

 

This is why easymode Imo diminish the game experience - yes I know I can read the quest description and all the names and everything. But people usually take up the path of least resistance. And although reading through a quest can be boring, the times I find myself have to doing so, I actually feel more immersed in what's going on.

Btw, voiceovers for quests doesn't help, becase if you can skip them and use a quest helper/  tracker instead, alot of people will skip it.

 

yep !that happened to me till this week when i tried to do what you did 

only i was on a trial in everquest 1 ho boy what a surprise it was !

i was only at the first guy when you arrive and i was like wtf no shinny no quest giver ?

oh its all there but forget the spoonfeeding lol,its like when our grandfather comew work you freaking lazy bone !<

i felt exactly that way with eq1 

and you know what it was  a refreshing change  for me

when i get the money i ll get that game

Originally posted by Inzra

I think alot of us including myself  , got away from the topic of the thread whics is 'immersion'.

and things like minimaps, arrows, floating symbols, makes it more conventient yes,

and removing them might not make the game all that much 'harder' to play,

but I do think it would help make you more immersed in the gameworld, the setting.

Immersion guys, immersion

Having worked on a singleplayer RPG which attempted to have zero UI for a while, I assure you minimaps are necessary.  Just like health bars are necessary.

There's a bare minimum of info that must be communicated to the player for them to have fun playing the game.

Without minimaps and quests, players simply do not find the fun.

I disagree on the quests part.  Players that lack imagination don't find the fun, because they aren't capable of making it for themselves.

Creative types do find it, or make it.

I'm reminded of SWG, which prior to it's implosion had very few quests, yet it had a very respectable population, in no small part due to roleplayers and immersion enthusiasts who made their own content with the tools available to them.

I agree on the maps part of your assertion.

I find running around like a twit for 30 minutes trying to find where I am supose to go to break immersion. 

Now I do prefer minimal, or even better fading UI so I don't like big symbols over peoples heads or glowing trails to lead me to my objective, but I also like to be able to bring up my map and tell where I am supose to go, I also hate missing content because I didn't see the person and have now out leveled them, so it is even better if my map showed quest givers too.

I can see the desire to not want to clutter the screen, but I don't understand why anyone would  not want to be told where the objective is, because having to hunt around for a specific location seems counter productive.

Originally posted by CactusmanX

I find running around like a twit for 30 minutes trying to find where I am supose to go to break immersion. 

Now I do prefer minimal, or even better fading UI so I don't like big symbols over peoples heads or glowing trails to lead me to my objective, but I also like to be able to bring up my map and tell where I am supose to go, I also hate missing content because I didn't see the person and have now out leveled them, so it is even better if my map showed quest givers too.

I can see the desire to not want to clutter the screen, but I don't understand why anyone would  not want to be told where the objective is, because having to hunt around for a specific location seems counter productive.

in eq1 and in wow you can lock level so you never miss content,some couple post here thats exactly what they do they felt they missed some of the new stuff they added so they lock their level

as for searching ,in a sense it seems couter productive but when you run around you meet new people ask question chit chat etc.yes it is slower yes its not for everybody !but for those who harent in a hurry to be at the end of the game ,and like more the road going there that actually be there a game like eq1 feel those req exactly

but its not for everybody 

Originally posted by veritas_X

I disagree on the quests part.  Players that lack imagination don't find the fun, because they aren't capable of making it for themselves.

No, I mean they literally will not find more than half of the content in the game, because they're not being actively reminded that there's new and different stuff out there.  They'll repetitively grind a single type of mob, then complain to you on the forums about your game being repetitive, tedious, and lacking mob variety.  They won't care that your counterargument is that there are more mob types out there.

There's a finite amount of content developers can create with any given budget, so it behooves them to communicate to players "hey, there's stuff to do over there!" because otherwise the players might not ever go there and see the cool content they spent multiple hours creating.

But probably the more important question is do you guys really want the game to be all about fields of randomly wandering monsters?   You would find that more interesting than having a narrative backing (however flimsy) behind your actions?

Originally posted by Axehilt

Originally posted by veritas_X

I disagree on the quests part.  Players that lack imagination don't find the fun, because they aren't capable of making it for themselves.

No, I mean they literally will not find more than half of the content in the game, because they're not being actively reminded that there's new and different stuff out there.  They'll repetitively grind a single type of mob, then complain to you on the forums about your game being repetitive, tedious, and lacking mob variety.  They won't care that your counterargument is that there are more mob types out there.

There's a finite amount of content developers can create with any given budget, so it behooves them to communicate to players "hey, there's stuff to do over there!" because otherwise the players might not ever go there and see the cool content they spent multiple hours creating.

But probably the more important question is do you guys really want the game to be all about fields of randomly wandering monsters?   You would find that more interesting than having a narrative backing (however flimsy) behind your actions?

You are right. The biggest benefit of directed quests is to show players all the different content. Back in the EQ days, people would grind a SINGLE mob for an appropriate level because that is the most efficient. That is just bad design and not use content effectively.

Modern quest based games fixed that.