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is auto assault death a good thing for MMOs?
The Drive-In (General) « Auto Assault 7/25/06 5:46:49 PM
I really liked the front-page comments from Blurr and TheAesthete - shame I didn't find this thread a week ago to comment on a more timely basis. Nevertheless, nothing stopping me from weighing in now. How good or bad AA's death is depends on what lessons developers, and to a lesser extent players, take away from it. The next time someone pitches a car-based MMO to try to get development money, they're inevitably going to face the question "didn't someone do that? Didn't it fail colossally?" While you and I know that there were deeper issues, that's not so apparent to everyone. It would be all too easy to look at the MMO environment and say "Fantasy sells big, sci-fi does ok, heroes are niche, cars are a flop. Make another Elves & Swords game!" That's bad, because not only does it rule out a genre with potential, but it underestimates what's needed to make a successful game. By contrast, I think the flop of DDO (is that premature?) is a good thing. On the surface, fantasy genre and known brand, it should have been huge. This inevitably prompts a deeper look. What does the deeper look show? Well lets try to compare AA with everyone's favorite 800 lb gorilla, WoW. (And if my impressions of the two games are incorrect, feel free to correct me.) Pacing: WoW is a rather slow-paced game. You spend 10 minutes going to a location, pull one guy, spend a minute or so fighting him, pull the next guy. Afterwards 10 minutes to run back, then half an hour getting trained and setting up an auction, etc. In AA by comparison, I can get from one city to another in a minute, destroying 10 buildings and killing 50 enemies along the way. And that's if I didn't want to rush and take INC. Takeaway = Slow play is good Leveling speed: The number I've seen for average time to reach lvl 60 in WoW is 500 hours. Not enough data for a good statistical sample on AA, but I'd say it's a tad shy of that. Takeaway = Nothing learned here Endgame Content: WoW = somewhat lacking. AA = Extremely lacking. Of course this is a problem for nearly everyone. Takeaway = You need an endgame, and soon. PvP: WoW has flagging by server, then to a lesser extent by zone, then to a lesser extent by action or opt-in. This creates an immersive PvP environment where PvP seems to grow organically, yet doesn't seem forced on players. AA has PvP by selecting an instance of a zone. It's not forced on people but never really positioned to tempt them either. Takeaway = Make PvP opportunities obvious and bait people with them. Skill vs Items vs Builds: Though debated, what makes a WoW player powerful seems to be first the items they have, then the build they've chosen, then the subtlety of technique with it. In AA, weapons seem to dominate in PvE but in PvP accuracy is downgraded to require aiming skill. In neither case do build choices seem as crucial. Takeaway = Powerful items make average players feel mighty. Build variations: While it's pretty much a given that certain set builds will be considered optimal no matter what (and perhaps not deservingly), it's worth considering the "how can it be done" choices. In WoW, 2 factions, 4 races in each faction, 8 classes among the faction, 3 divergent trees for each class, enough talent points to limit progress up different trees. That's a lot of choices. In AA, 3 races, 4 classes in each race, 3 trees but not mutually exclusive. Builds tend to converge unintentinally, before even looking to guides. Takeaway = Varied builds tempt players Crafting: Both WoW and AA have crafting. AA's is more complex, and rarely leads to crafted items being better than found ones. Lack of an auction house means crafting for others isn't easy either. Takeaway = Crafting is good, but it must be simple with obvious benefits Teamwork vs solo play: In AA you can get all the way to level 80 solo. In WoW, you can get to level 60 solo, but you miss out on a lot. In both cases, for average play teaming is optional and short-lived (And occaisionally counter-productive.) However, WoW creates situations that make teaming more tempting especially full teams or larger raids. AA requires players make their own opportunities, at best allowing things sooner via teams. Takeaway = Teamwork, especially with large numbers, is a selling point. Roles on teams: WoW has variety in characters, and this variety creates roles on teams so players feel needed. AA has some variety in characters, but in terms of play experience teams are made from whoever is available. There's very little "we need a ..." and any player is replaceable with pretty much anyone else. Takeaway = Build players toward team roles Instances: Both make use of instances in small amounts but for the most part have a larger shared world. Takeaway = Nothing learned here I'm sure I've left out factors, and perhaps mis-evaulated some. And of course the lessons would be different if comparing two other games. But as I see it, a producer looks at the failure of AA and the success of WoW, and tells the next developers: "Make a fantasy game with a slow pace. Have fixed roles but options within them, and make teaming necessary for the most powerful gear but optional overall. Gear is very important, so make sure loot has a powerful effect on the game. Crafting needs to be simple but with obvious rewards and an available marketplace. PvP should be avoidable, but make sure it's in players' faces so they're tempted by it. And get them to the top level quick, but come up with something to do after that." If that describes the perfect game for you, then the failure of AA (and success of WoW) is a good thing. |
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Not to threadjack, but on the 16th you asked about CoV and it's chat capabilities. That game is excellent for teams and conversations, second IMHO only to itself on the hero side. Yet in 6 days you've apparently gotten it, tried it, and disliked it enough to go searching for something else. I'm curious what you personally disliked about it so quickly. And by way of apology for the threadjack, may I suggest "Saga of Ryzom?" I haven't personally played it (yet) but I've heard high reviews from people whose opinions I respect with backgrounds and interests similar to yours. |
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15-20 His name is Tarikoss Cap au Diable, on the East side, standing next to a circular Circle-style portal. I think the minimum is 4 people, but I believe there's both an AV and a monster at the end so a full team isn't a bad idea. About 3 hours. I'd be shocked if you haven't had this answered by now in the official forums. But if you like TaskForces/StrikeForces enough, check the forum for your server because they're probably a badge channel you can join that will help you immensely with this stuff. |
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Freakalympics is not a TaskForce. It's a Story Arc available only from Tech contacts in the 25-29 range. It ends with a cool custom-designed map and a fight against Mistah Static. The fact that you didn't know this proves not only that you've missed a lot of content, but that you didn't even bother to play with the site I gave you. There's a lot of noise here, so I'm going to cut right to the point. Your problems are self-caused. You don't want to fight Dr. Vahzilok? THEN STOP CHOOSING HIM! There are 12 contacts in that level range alone who won't even think about giving you that mission, not counting late-arc Hollows ones. You don't have to get the Spelunker badge, even if you want it you don't have to get the mission yourself, and even if you choose to you don't have to follow any more of that contact's missions after you get it. I understand what you're saying, you want choice B to lock out A, C, D, and E. Well I don't like lockouts and some downright hate them. But it doesn't matter anyway if you personally keep choosing option B! Seems to me your whole point was asking to "fight a few clocks instead of nazis." If that doesn't matter to you, then you plain won't be happy. Giving you benefit of the doubt, perhaps you're asking for more substantial arcs at lower levels. A, that's what high levels are for. And B, until the recent AV-to-EB scaling was invented that would trap someone where teaming is forced, which is something at least back in the day they were trying to avoid at low levels. CoV is some indication that they're backing off on it a little, a hint for when they rework Boomtown and Faultline. In the meantime, the 20+ world has a lot content. (Excepting 35-39 if you purely solo on heroic, but that's a known issue.) The little pessimist on my shoulder is telling me you don't like the game, you just like complaining about it. I hope he's wrong and you'll use that site I linked to for planning your contacts and experienceing different arcs. If he's right, well I'll leave you to it. |
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Believe it or not, it is that way, at least in City of Heroes. Not forced, but encouraged, so that it's easier to get story arcs (and the AVs therein) for your Origin. It's not forced because you can imagine all the yelling that would result - "What do you mean I can't get the Freakalympics story unless I'm Tech?" Your starting contact is one of the 5 in Atlas Park or Galaxy City based on your Origin. The missions are all fairly similar because you're low level, but they are origin-specific. And when you hit level 5, he/she gives the next contact for that origin. Ditto at 10/15/20 etc. Here's where it gets confusing however - if you do a certain amount of that contact's content, they give you the option of a same-level, different-origin contact. Say you start Science with Jonathan Smythe. When you get to 5, he introduces you to Kip Cantorum, a level 5-10 Science contact. You run his missions, and by level 7 he offers you an introduction to Juan Jimenez (Mutation) or Tony Kord (Tech). You choose Juan and run some of his missions too. Now when you hit 10, Kip will introduce you to the next Science contact and Juan will introduce you to the next Tech one. You can repeat this over and over and have all 5 sets opened up by the low teens. The problem is, it's not obvious what origin a contact is. So you could get introduced to Hugo Redding, decide you like running his missions, and start favoring Magic storylines without even knowing it. Most people don't care anyway. If you do, make an effort to stick to Magic contacts. Here is an excellent site for keeping track of all that. I should add, Dr. Vahz (science) is the only AV in an arc at that level. But the lack of an AV doesn't make a storyline less legitimate, and it all balances out in the long run. Tsoo are a particular group fans have been asking for more of for some time now, and unfortunately there's not nearly enough of them. Some groups are just intended for certain level ranges, and that's probably for the best since it would be more repetitive (and frankly a level 3 Malta would have to be so underpowered to be fightable at that level that the whole group would look lame). Look at the Circle of Thorns for a group existing from 1-50, they grow and have different mage types and increasing stories. Yet people complain. Here you certainly have a point. I think it was originally intended this way as a check against making anything too difficult for players - if you get a mission you can't beat, do something else until you level and come back. That's largely untrue anymore, except with certain AVs (esp when someone wants to solo them). Even more confusing, arcs (and enemies) are capped. So if you have an open Banished Pantheon Arc (say, The Scroll of Tielekku) that you haven't finished and you're at 33 now, any mission you get, even on Invicible, will have level 30s. This is actually somewhat exploitable for stealthing toons that want to jump to the end for a nice Invinc bonus, but it's largely confusing to thos who don't know. |
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I wouldn't want to call you a liar, your statements seem pretty straightforward and I don't see much point in it. But something isn't adding up. That's completely inconsistent with their policy. They have a standard of changing offensive or trademarking-infringing names to GenericHero1234. At worst they delete the character and give a warning. For deliberate griefing I've never seen a first offense get worse than 2 weeks suspension. They don't even check the character databases on any regular basis - there'd have to have been petitions against you to even get their attention. Any chance this Stalin's Hammer was pulling high-level mobs to safe areas, shrieking profanity across broadcast, and offering free child porn in exchange for stolen credit card numbers? |
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