Dana Massey Asks Why Not?: A Vampire MMO
Vampires are the one genre that seems to draw as many women as men. Might it be the secret to getting more women into an MMO?
Column By Dana Massey on October 08, 2009
;)
Bella Lugosi must kick off any
article that uses the word vampire.
There is one genre out there that is relatively untested by MMOs and even games in general. It’s popular, one of the hottest sub-genres out there right now in fact, and perfectly suited to gaming. It also appeals to both men and women, albeit in different ways. So today, I ask you: Why not a Vampire MMO?
MMOs have always been a bit of an old boys club. Sure, women do play them, but no game has come even close to an even split. It could simply be that women don’t like video games, but if anyone can overcome that and make a game that both men and women enjoy equally, they’re going to be a very rich company.
In his recent Austin Game Developers Conference keynote, SOE President John Smedley threw out an interesting statistic. While women make up only a third of the audience of Free Realms, they account for a majority of its micro-transactions. Yes, women buy things.
So how has no one tried a vampire MMO yet? (And yes, I do know CCP is doing World of Darkness, but since we have no idea what exactly that game will be like, I'm choosing to ignore it for today!)
Twilight, True Blood, Vampire Diaries... Vampires have always been popular, but right now they’re definitely on an upswing. What’s curious about them, though, is that unlike many other genres suitable for a video game, there is a strong female following to vampire fiction.
;)
Vampires For Boys...
Guys like them because they’re immortal, they kick some ass, and suck blood. There’s something cool about the mythology and many popular male oriented vampire intellectual properties combine other elements of mythology, such as werewolves. Think Underworld.
;)
Vampires For Girls...
Women like them because of their inherit romanticism. They’re sexy, brooding characters and their tragic circumstances make for wonderful love stories.
Has there ever been a genre with more potential to break open the female market, without alienating male players?
Sure, I’m generalizing. Yes, there are women that would want to experience the violence and men who prefer the more romantic vision of vampires, but stereotypically, these categories make sense.
It would be a tough tight-rope to walk, but what I propose to day is a vampire MMO where two fundamental choices dramatically alters the way your character interacts with the world: Male or female? Living or undead?
;)
If you really think about it, this guy
can be blamed for Twilight.
From there, players would have two paths they can walk down each time they undertake a quest. One is a more traditional MMO experience aimed primarily at the stereotypical male audience and the other is a lighter, more casual, story-driven dynamic aimed at women.
The male targeted experience would be more familiar. It would be violent, revolving around war, hunting, feeding and the thirst for blood. Players could harvest “the living” NPCs to stay powerful as they embrace they embark on all sorts of asskickery using their vampire powers.
Super speed, mesmerizing others, flight, and the ability to tear opponents limb from limb. It would be a pretty hardcore MMO experience.
The female targeted game would revolve around the moral issues of vampirism and the love stories that dominate a lot of recent vampire fiction.
The core mechanics would of course be the same, it’s becomes about player choice and gives people the ability to customize their experience to their particular view of this kind of fiction.
;)
Eric or Bill? Hint: Guy with fangs
out is actually the nice guy.
Essentially, players would need to decide whether they want to play as the good, tortured vampire type or the more evil, chaotic type. For fans of True Blood, do you want to be Bill Compton or Eric Northman?
So, say in a quest, a local vampire leader asks that you attack a human rival’s home and turn his daughter or son as retribution. This could be played two ways, and the group would have to decide how best to do it based on their alignment.
;)
Good or Evil? Two
styles for one game.
On one hand, they could attack the base, cut through the defenses, slaughter anyone in their way and do as they were asked.
On the other hand, they could charm their way into the house, warn the father of the plan, and help him get the daughter/son to safety.
From there the content would branch. The “good” players might pursue a quest line that involves a love interest, while the “bad” players would escalate the war.
What else would be nice about a Vampire MMO would be the game’s ability, directly through its fiction, to let players enjoy the game in a setting they’re comfortable with.
Most MMOs have servers, which are identical clones. What if a Vampire MMO had servers people could travel between, one type set in a modern time and the other in the Victorian era.
Within the fiction, it would be the same character at different points in their life. For the players, it would let them play the style they enjoy and the ability to “enter” different periods of their life as they see fit would be quite attractive.
;)
Maybe we can somehow rope comedy
in too? This movie was gold! GOLD!
Of course, some suspension of disbelief would be required. There would be no reason not to make character progression ongoing, despite the fact that one technically takes place before the other. That said, items would likely need to be limited by era, lest someone walk into a Victorian setting with an Uzi.
Now the obvious flaw with this entire idea is that in two ways it doubles up on content. Designers would need to develop two divergent paths for the characters to take and two different worlds for them to explore.
This is true, but unlike other ideas where this is necessary, the reason for doing it is not only true to the fiction, but also has a purely capitalistic reason for being. Simply put, if making the divergent quest content increases the number of female players dramatically, it opens up new and profitable revenue streams that simply wouldn’t exist in any other way.
It’d be a monumental undertaking, but of any of the genres I’ve thrown out, this is the one that has the biggest potential to draw in a new audience that this industry so desperately craves.
More Dana Massey Asks Why Not? Features:
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Each Thursday, he asks the question "Why Not?" about some element of MMOs.
I would play a Vampire MMO, but only if I could play a vampire hunter.
As for women liking to buy things? Yeah, and water is wet.
pretty tired of reading these "Why nots" got anything else to write about? i got more why nots than you.
I /wrists at the thought of a vampire mmo....
A highlander MMo on the other hand....................................
Since vampires are awesome, and always have been (no, Twilight did not corrupt Vampires for me), a Vampire MMO would be good.
It's a good thing CCP and White wolf teamed up to make one, then. The World of Darkness MMO could be really cool.
An MMO based on "There can only be one." sounds unlikely at best.
the day you see the movie Twilight mentioned on mmorpg could mean the world is coming to an end or at least hell is freezing over
There is already a Vampire MMO in works, being developed by CCP/Whitewolf. World of Darkness is infinitely better than the T-word-book-movie-wannabe-vampires.
Seriously, here's the math.
(T-Vampire-movie) x Infinity = World of Darkness
Vampire: Bloodline is a vampire mmo. or was. Not sure if it exists anymore. I've heard rumours of multiple vampire vs werewolf games in the works.
An MMO based on "There can only be one." sounds unlikely at best.
Highlander probably would have to be a perma death game, hehe.
I know you're trying to troll, but honestly, I agree. This was pretty close to the bottom of my "why not" barrel for now ;)
...I'm likely going to adopt a new premise in the coming weeks.
Anyone got any suggestions? ;)
Lol. Yup. If killed by another immortal. I'd actually try it if it was made right. Which it wouldn't be.
Could be pretty cool though, and the Epeen for the last immortal would be huge.
I know you're trying to troll, but honestly, I agree. This was pretty close to the bottom of my "why not" barrel for now ;)
...I'm likely going to adopt a new premise in the coming weeks.
Anyone got any suggestions? ;)
Dude, some of these have been pretty interesting discussions.
The survival horror thread, in particular.
An MMO based on "There can only be one." sounds unlikely at best.
Oh, It would work perfectly and be insanely awesome.
All players are Immortals, so pvp could be handeled very interestingly.
Gear wouldn't be a huge thing except weapons
Death would be temperary, essiently to make the mmo fair, players heads can't be lopped off but NPC's heads could.
Queen could provide the soundtrack.....
It's setting to be any time, how ever modern would be the coolest; one could have instances which were memories to incorperate different times....
*Cough*, I'm running off topic.... Vampires are intollerable... I may be able to accept the idea of a underworld mmo though....
I think an mmo where your out of shape progressively aging toon wakes up to some sort of horribly annoying sound then stumbles off to some no where job would be awesome. You could farm faction by working over time or by doing self degrading things for your significant other.
OH WAIT>>>>we already have that one - it's called RL (real life).
Anyway, yeah Massey is spot on. Folks would play a vamp mmorpg - you would have to include clans though (Kindred the Embraced). However, pvp would confuse the developers, and most likely it would be a gang land free for all or have really pointless pvp with titles that could go back and forth or such. The numbers would shrink until only the severely obese would keep playing so that they could pretent they are going to live forever...and the developers, in all their brilliance, as the game ticks its dying breath would ignore the please of a shrinking fan base, state something like "LET THEM EAT CAKE" as the Bastille crumbled...and would instead create a patch that gave silly masks to their suck...er subscribers.
Make games for gamers by gamers - death to the burgoise mmorpg industry!
Vive le Revolution!
I'd play an MMORPG based on the p&p rpg V:TM. Would have one big problem though: expectations. V:TM has been there for dozens of years, has lots of fans and tons and tons of background and stories and lore and whatnot. I don't know how an MMORPG could pick up all that and then not disappoint.
In theory though... it would be great. The intrigues... games with might and power... the hunt for blood, the clans and stuff with their abilities and whatnot. Practically though, I doubt that there is a company out there who would have the patience and knowledge to successfully create an mmorpg about that without disappointing. I mean, creating an mmorpg about v:tm that does not disappoint... it's about as possible as writing the complete history of egypt onto your fingertip. Or if someone would try to wrap up the contents of all star-trek episodes within 3 words.
Lol. Yup. If killed by another immortal. I'd actually try it if it was made right. Which it wouldn't be.
Could be pretty cool though, and the Epeen for the last immortal would be huge.
Probably wouldn't be made right. Would be cool if the perma thing was optional, so if you went to a certain area to fight another immortal, the winner becomes stronger while the loser loses his character. It gives incentive for risking your character while the rest are just run of the mill weak types.
That or there truly would be only 1. i think that way though, the game would end so kind of need a mix. Probably have to find a way to prevent people from inflating another's power by losing to 1 person over and over with a new immortal.
How can you guys all sit here and talk about no Vampire MMO's when we have the awesomeness known as Bite Fight just a few clicks away?
It boggles the mind really :(
Heh, sorry, off track with the Highlander thing.
As far as vampires, I think that would be interesting. As previously said, world of darkness, or maybe some mixture of vampires, demons wizards etc. Maybe something like Jim Butcher's Dresdin series. You have all kinds of options and variety to make an interesting game and it would be set in our world basically.
Have to add in some of the others monsters to spice it up and allow for hunters of the creatures.
I know you're trying to troll, but honestly, I agree. This was pretty close to the bottom of my "why not" barrel for now ;)
...I'm likely going to adopt a new premise in the coming weeks.
Anyone got any suggestions? ;)
I have one. "Why haven't they..." First topic?
Why haven't they fired you as a writer yet? You're by far the worst addition to MMORPG.com and even though I will probably be banned for that statement, I stand by it. A vampire MMO? Really!? REALLY!?
It's bad enough that I have to deal with my 12-14 year old students convinced that vampires are real because of garbage like Twilight, Vampire Diaries, True Blood, etc. It's ok to have fantasies but to feed this continual delusion of vampiric beings just to profit off the insanity of youth is another thing. This industry does not crave a new audience, it craves a unique world that does not promise everything and fail to deliver on anything. The MMO community has burned itself out on investing time, fandom, money, and patience into developers that only seek to get World of Warcraft-like returns off something with minimal work on their part.
There is an audience for vampires but the MMO community is not that audience. If we were, a developer would have already made such a game. Perhaps I will eat some crow when the new Whitewolf MMO comes out but until then, I think it will be an abysmal failure. I know MMO players good sir, and MMO players are not teenage girls getting goofy romantic over the idea of someone biting their neck in the dead of night.
I have one. "Why haven't they..." First topic?
Why haven't they fired you as a writer yet? You're by far the worst addition to MMORPG.com and even though I will probably be banned for that statement, I stand by it. A vampire MMO? Really!? REALLY!?
It's bad enough that I have to deal with my 12-14 year old students convinced that vampires are real because of garbage like Twilight, Vampire Diaries, True Blood, etc. It's ok to have fantasies but to feed this continual delusion of vampiric beings just to profit off the insanity of youth is another thing. This industry does not crave a new audience, it craves a unique world that does not promise everything and fail to deliver on anything. The MMO community has burned itself out on investing time, fandom, money, and patience into developers that only seek to get World of Warcraft-like returns off something with minimal work on their part.
There is an audience for vampires but the MMO community is not that audience. If we were, a developer would have already made such a game. Perhaps I will eat some crow when the new Whitewolf MMO comes out but until then, I think it will be an abysmal failure. I know MMO players good sir, and MMO players are not teenage girls getting goofy romantic over the idea of someone biting their neck in the dead of night.
Yet you play games where you pretend to be something you aren't....nice logic. I pity our public schools. Obviously you missed out on Castlevania...
Well a purely Vampire MMO i dont think would be such a great idea, however a book series which does incorporate vampires as well as many other things (werewolves, undead, etc) into it which i think would make for an awesome MMO is Necroscope. A lot of the story takes place in modern day earth and is a mix of ESPers/Telepaths, modern technology, and the supernatural all fighting alongside and against eachother. As far as the ESPers go they have many different talents such as speaking with the dead, telepathy, mind control, locaters, empaths, precognition, teleportation, and many other things. Then as you get into the story it takes you through a portal into what would be considered the "vampire world' (knows as Sunside/Starside in the book) where vampires are pretty much dominant over the humans and hunt them freely while ruling from their aieres (towerlike castles) infested with all of their underlings and horrible creations of flesh that they breed from their own imaginations to suit their powers. in this world the humans tend to live in gypsy like tribes constantly on the move hiding from the vampires. also each of the ruling vampires & their underlings also have very unique capabilities to set them apart from eachother and they are constantly vying for power.
Anyway, with such a concept of the different types forces as well as the 2 different earths/worlds linked by portals you could have some very nice faction pvp. Our earth could basically have 3 factions, the espers/telepaths vs the supernatural vs advanced technology... then also have Sunside/Starside with different factions of vampires, as well as the human tribe factions. This would allow the factions to battle not only within their own worlds, but also to travel between the two worlds and choose to join with or fight against the various factions from the other world
I'm actually very surprised that a vampire mmo hasn't been created yet. Even before Twilight (which is utter crap), we had some interesting vampire settings. Anne Rice's vampire world, Vampire Hunter D, Bram Stoker's, hell even Blade (it is an interesting idea in theory).
PvP would have to play a huge role in the game, and of course there would need to be at least two factions. Werewolves seem to be tied into Vampire lore as of late, so a Vamp vs. Werewolf vs.Human's would be an interesting idea. If you want pure vampire goodness, could have Evil Vamps with their Human followers vs. Humans and Reluctant/Rogue Vampires. Even Good Vamp vs. Bad Vamp. The possibilities are near limitless.
Vampire mythology has always intrigued humans. So many taboos are incorporated with vampire mythology, so it's a natural outlet for us.
vampire vs werewolf vs zombie ftw :)
hearing underworld suggestion was brilliant honestly... sets the pvp and evil vs good alliances up already of course neither could really be good but its a really good start
oh heck ya add zombies then throw in humans as the neutral prey lol
id hope theyd make a cirqu du freak kind of vampire game
and have the two waring vampire factions
itd set it up perfectly for two different alliances
and you can have humans as a race as well for the vampire hunters
throwing in the third faction to try to help balance things out.
But hey thats just what i think.
lol
Also there already is a vampire mmorpg, it sucks compared to todays standards graphically and had a crazy amount of hackers and etc it was call Dark Eden.
It sucked but its the only one that ive ever seen its a shame.
Theres so many untest genres that no one has tried to venture into.
I say they should and make a whole new batch of mmos instead of the same old same old.
/Use Bite Attack
*cooldown*
/Use Bite Attack
lol thats pretty much all dark eden was lol
that and speed hacks
cirqu du freak vampires use wepons tho
so itd kinda be like a regular mmo weapon wise.
Except the vampires in that werent aloud to use ranged weapons besides stuff you could throw.
the humans however could use crossbows and etc because they werent as strong as the vampires and vampeneze
I would play a mmo with vampires, lycans, and humans all fighting against eachother. Seems like it would naturally fit as three way RvR. Vampires and lycans trying to kill eachother and the humans trying to stop the inhuman menace. Also could probably make it so the lycan and vampires could try and just act human and get by on stealth alone. Would really give a sense of not knowing who to trust, and if you are being hunted or not.
Just to clarify, Twilight is not "vampires for women". It's a poorly written dream journal for pre-pubescent tween idiots about faerie-folk(look it up) which have been mistakenly labeled "vampires" by a writer that even Stephen King of all people thinks is sub-par.
Dracula(be it Bram's, Lugosi's or the actual Impaler),Nicholas Knight, Angel, Spike, Vampire Hunter D, Alucard(Castlevania SotN), the males from Underworld(specifically the lycans) and more than half of the clans from Vampire: The Masquerade appeal to women. I used to play Masquerade tabletop in many different groups and the female players far outnumbered the males.
Enter CCP. World of Darkness may be an unknown quantity as an mmo as yet but it is based on the Masquerade, which Underworld was based on, and will likely include the wolves(the superior creature as far as this male and his wife are concerned).
In a nutshell, the author is wrong, and seriously stuck in an age of stereotype marketing that is 20 years passed(Once Bitten).
what about CCP's World of Darkness game ? Is it just a pc game or is it gonna be a mmo, which i heard it was
Dude, some of these have been pretty interesting discussions.
The survival horror thread, in particular.
Right, but eventually, you need to take a break from a topic before the barrel is completely empty. Just time for a different slant, I think.
I did earn myself some haters, so I must be doing something right ;)
Dude, some of these have been pretty interesting discussions.
The survival horror thread, in particular.
Right, but eventually, you need to take a break from a topic before the barrel is completely empty. Just time for a different slant, I think.
I did earn myself some haters, so I must be doing something right ;)
NVM
I know you're trying to troll, but honestly, I agree. This was pretty close to the bottom of my "why not" barrel for now ;)
...I'm likely going to adopt a new premise in the coming weeks.
Anyone got any suggestions? ;)
"This is Why Not."
I read they are making a Twilight mmo.
Why Not A Vampire MMO?
Because it would SUCK.
You get it... because vampires...nevermind
whoever thought up that one should just kill themselves right now. horrible story, and absolutely nothing to make an mmo, or any game out of
Yeah I wonder how CCP is going to pull off WoD. Ive been a long fan of the PnP game and can't wait for it to release. I like the V:TM lore for vampires the most anyways. Im sure they will do an amazing job, I think EvE is an amazing game its just I cant handle being a ship all day. Im not much of Space kinda guy. I like the PA setting and Vampires a ton though.
LMAO a highlander mmo would be awsome
pvp would be like this- kill a noob then they have to reroll because there can be only one
as far as a vamp mmo as long as i can be a vamp hunter all would be good
i remember a game called legacy of kain that had an interesting concept which might transfer well into an mmo .
If I remember correctly, Horizons in its design phases was playing around with the idea that they would have a Vampire race that would just look like the normal human race. I'm sure this got killed, along with most of the uniqueness that Horizons had planned besides the "YOU CAN BE A DRAGON!!!", due to budgets and lack of a good implementation.
I miss the game Horizons thought it would be. Lizard people that get faster or slower depending on the weather. A insect race that were the only ones to have a global chat due to the hive mind. Vampires that could mimic being just a normal human. Angels, demons, Merfolk... all playable races. So many good ideas and no follow through.
I know you're trying to troll, but honestly, I agree. This was pretty close to the bottom of my "why not" barrel for now ;)
...I'm likely going to adopt a new premise in the coming weeks.
Anyone got any suggestions? ;)
Keep with the "why nots" they're nice and make people think for a change.
The greatest idea here was the whole divergent quest idea, which really would work with any mmo genre and be freaking AWSOME.
All in all good read
Edit: And i think we can all agree that twilight was a badly written book with a cliche story and charecters, cept Alice who was cool
whoever thought up that one should just kill themselves right now. horrible story, and absolutely nothing to make an mmo, or any game out of
Oh I do agree. I can't stand Twilight. i watched it once to give it a chance. There is just way too much stupidity in it for me to even take it serious.
"We have to go 200 miles from civilization into the mountains to play baseball. Even then we have to go during a thunderstorm because we hit the ball so hard that people would still hear us. And to hit the ball? We have this magical wooden bat that never breaks under such force."
Little stupid things like this the whole damn movie. I can deal with Harry Potter. Spiderwick was ok for what it was. But when I see grown ups swoon over non-sense, makes no sense movies, I am stumped. Why is this crap so popular?
Oh I do agree. I can't stand Twilight. i watched it once to give it a chance. There is just way too much stupidity in it for me to even take it serious.
"We have to go 200 miles from civilization into the mountains to play baseball. Even then we have to go during a thunderstorm because we hit the ball so hard that people would still hear us. And to hit the ball? We have this magical wooden bat that never breaks under such force."
Little stupid things like this the whole damn movie. I can deal with Harry Potter. Spiderwick was ok for what it was. But when I see grown ups swoon over non-sense, makes no sense movies, I am stumped. Why is this crap so popular?
One word "Tweens"
Most Emo mmorpg ever! Would that be Emmorpg?
Oh I do agree. I can't stand Twilight. i watched it once to give it a chance. There is just way too much stupidity in it for me to even take it serious.
"We have to go 200 miles from civilization into the mountains to play baseball. Even then we have to go during a thunderstorm because we hit the ball so hard that people would still hear us. And to hit the ball? We have this magical wooden bat that never breaks under such force."
Little stupid things like this the whole damn movie. I can deal with Harry Potter. Spiderwick was ok for what it was. But when I see grown ups swoon over non-sense, makes no sense movies, I am stumped. Why is this crap so popular?
One word "Tweens"
That...and essentially they merged vampires with danielle steel to make a vampire/rebel without a cause-hybrid. Very popular with young girls.
I don't think the vampire fad is still in ascendancy. I would say it's peaked and in decline - something akin to the Jonas Brothers. If someone had been able to release a game this year or even next, it could still cash in on the craze, but that window is closing fast. All the same, when/if CCP does something with World of Darkness, I'll be all over it. As long as there is a chance that it will have some of the magic of V:TM - Bloodlines.
It''s called World of Darkness. Purchased by CCP. Thank god a company that has some balls that will actually do something innovative purchased the IP.
Werewolves(the cool badass kind), Vampires, Changlings, Mages... lots of fun to be had. Add into it all the source material with the different clans and factions and its ripe for an outstanding PvP game.
What about WoDO, World of Darkness Online by White wolf in development?
I'm keeping my fingers crossed that CCP follows along the same path they traveled with EVE. Make a great Vampire MMO with a select target audience in mind and don't change your entire game attempting to please everyone.
I like vampires becuase they are immortal, kick ass, and suck blood. After all i tested on a quiz and I think 66% male and I am a female cat! Mrrrowww!
I have never understood why most women don't game. I mean what in the hell do they do all the time? Whore it up on myspace and listen to jonas brothers or what? Grr c'mon fellow Females! (wips out claws and starts to go on a prowl!) HISS!!
I have one. "Why haven't they..." First topic?
Why haven't they fired you as a writer yet? You're by far the worst addition to MMORPG.com and even though I will probably be banned for that statement, I stand by it. A vampire MMO? Really!? REALLY!?
It's bad enough that I have to deal with my 12-14 year old students convinced that vampires are real because of garbage like Twilight, Vampire Diaries, True Blood, etc. It's ok to have fantasies but to feed this continual delusion of vampiric beings just to profit off the insanity of youth is another thing. This industry does not crave a new audience, it craves a unique world that does not promise everything and fail to deliver on anything. The MMO community has burned itself out on investing time, fandom, money, and patience into developers that only seek to get World of Warcraft-like returns off something with minimal work on their part.
There is an audience for vampires but the MMO community is not that audience. If we were, a developer would have already made such a game. Perhaps I will eat some crow when the new Whitewolf MMO comes out but until then, I think it will be an abysmal failure. I know MMO players good sir, and MMO players are not teenage girls getting goofy romantic over the idea of someone biting their neck in the dead of night.
No, I don't think you do. You may know your small circle of friends of mmo players, but you don't know what the majority of MMO players want. There most certainly is an mmo audience for a vampire MMO, and White Wolf has grown that audience for years and years. You may not...no, you most certainly have not been in touch with that online community, but I have. If CCP rolls out a decent game you will most certainly be eating the crow you mentioned above. And there will be tons of vampire loving males and females there to pour "you are wrong" sauce on your bird.
You can play a vampire in Sacred. And of course you can become one in Oblivion also. I know they are single player RPGs, but whatever. Yeah, a vampire MMO based on The Masquerade would be pretty cool. I know for certain I could not resist playing as a Nosferatu. It would be even better for them to add the White Wolf werewolf (Apocolyps) and ghost (forget the name) factions as well. World of Darkness sounds pretty close to that, and as someone already said before me in this thread, it would have to absolutely perfect. A steep mountain indeed.
At the risk of sounding glib, the people who're into the whole vampire thing, take themselves WAY to seriously to make an enjoyable and online game community.
You'd have a core of deadly serious community members, and... thats about it. Anyone not serious enough would be driven away.
To everyone who posted that I seem to have forgotten WoD...
Please read articles before posting.
4th paragraph...
I wholeheartedly agree with the idea of throwing in the towel on the "Why not?" idea. For a while now (if not for it's entirety) it's felt more like just rambling about stuff pulled out of a random topic generator.
Perhaps what you could write on next is things that could either help developers or players get to know more about the genre and the games and how/why certain things work. For example, an article on death systems. What are the currently used death systems out there, what are the pros/cons of them, and why are some more popular than others. This might help developers look at how and why they do death systems the way they do. Perhaps take a look at unique features that have either triumphed or failed horribly. The public quest system was introduced into Warhammer and has been a huge hit as features go, other games have already used it to enhance their own experience. The diplomacy mini-game for Vanguard was quite a novel idea as well, and while it ended up being turned to junk by poor live-team handling, it certainly started off as something that could have hooked on. What about a guide to properly dealing with the opposite sex in MMOs. Clearly it's an issue that needs to be discussed when I hear people in the general chat of the latest hit MMO telling people that "if you are a male playing a female character, you should have a name that indicates you are male behind the screen", so they can know who to hit on and who not to, of all things. They are afraid of hitting on someone of the same sex, but have no problem propositioning every person of the opposite sex they come across.
Of course, with topics like that you can't just phone-it-in either :p
I've been dying for a Vampire MMO for years. I just pray it'll be good, more to the style of WoD, and not some of the crap we've been seeing lately in movies. But everyone already said all of this.
My question is, forget MMO for a second, has there even been a decent vampire game in general since Bloodlines?
Bloodlines was awesome, yeah, but it's way old at this point, and I don't remember anything else that's decent that came out since it.
The thing i find interesting about this thread is the initial 'lets ignore CCP/WW game because we know nothing about it' statement, followed by the number of people that have said 'underworld' would be a cool setting. kind of one and the same, as Underworld was initially written as a WW novel, with appropriate legal action launched...... . web.archive.org/web/20080212032144/http://www.white-wolf.com/News/underworldrelease.html
i look forward to seeing whatever iteration a vampire / modern supernatural mmo takes, and hope it is not just vampire. i want me a werebear :)
I've always wanted to be an vampire in MMO, one of the best idea for MMO I've ever heard. I like this kind of mythologie since my childhood and I will always like this.
Ok plain and simple. When CCP and White Wolf release World of Darkness I WILL play. Simple.
I would love to see a World of Darkness game, where its based off 2nd edition rules and you can play werewolves. I guarentee it would have to have pvp, because making a WoD game is like putting a "EMO kidz here plz" sign up over the server. killing them would be the only joy such a game could bring.
I agree. It would nice to have a good PvP faction-based MMORPG with more than 2-3 factions. WoD would be perfect for that.
I wholeheartedly agree with the idea of throwing in the towel on the "Why not?" idea. For a while now (if not for it's entirety) it's felt more like just rambling about stuff pulled out of a random topic generator.
Perhaps what you could write on next is things that could either help developers or players get to know more about the genre and the games and how/why certain things work. For example, an article on death systems. What are the currently used death systems out there, what are the pros/cons of them, and why are some more popular than others. This might help developers look at how and why they do death systems the way they do. Perhaps take a look at unique features that have either triumphed or failed horribly. The public quest system was introduced into Warhammer and has been a huge hit as features go, other games have already used it to enhance their own experience. The diplomacy mini-game for Vanguard was quite a novel idea as well, and while it ended up being turned to junk by poor live-team handling, it certainly started off as something that could have hooked on. What about a guide to properly dealing with the opposite sex in MMOs. Clearly it's an issue that needs to be discussed when I hear people in the general chat of the latest hit MMO telling people that "if you are a male playing a female character, you should have a name that indicates you are male behind the screen", so they can know who to hit on and who not to, of all things. They are afraid of hitting on someone of the same sex, but have no problem propositioning every person of the opposite sex they come across.
Of course, with topics like that you can't just phone-it-in either :p
I like them. I look forward to them like a good editorial section with a common theme. They didn't always have to do with things that I like to discuss here, but most of them were very inspiring. I hope you still do some from time to time.
I always thought the Legacy of Kain series could be made into an MMO. There was like 12 vamp clans (hunters also) before Raziel came back. You could even have "prototype" soul reavers as something similar to a Jedi class.
I have heard of a Twilight MMO has been shopped around, but me and my Comp fund(A.K.A. change filling jar.) are waiting for WoDo
Ignoring the World of Darkness MMO is a big mistake. If it is true to the lineage of pen and paper games you should be able to play as a vampire(one of several clans), werewolf(one of several tribes), hunter, or mage. The World of Darkness pen and paper games were Vampire, Werewolf, Hunter, and Mage so I would expect to see all 4 represented by the players. As for me, I have to be true to my kin and have a Vampire avatar for the game.
Vampire Bloodlines was one of the very best action-adventure-rpgs ever!
Anyone who likes the setting should try to find a cheap version of it and install it together with unofficial patch 6.x...
This Setting translated into an MMO could be working very very well.
Hmm, vampire MMO with lots of likely hot female gamers playing? Where do I sign up?
I'd play anything even remotely to do with the LoK series. I loved those games.
Shadowbane had vampire race, that was all the vampire I ever needed in any game. :)
Well since it is well known that CCP is working on one, that rather deflates your article, although I am surprised they are the only developer currently doing so.
World of darkness is a lot more than just vampires but you are right, at least one game about vampires are in development,based on the original "Vampire" RPG.
I am sure we will see a few others in time, a vampire hunter game in the late 1800s would be fun to play also.
A vampire mmo would be nice if it was done well. Which would very most likely not be the case.
I want a MMO where I can play a dragon dual-wielding katana while riding a chopper.?
I would love a vampire based mmo. As long as it has nothing in common with Twilight! Twilight is an insult to vamp fans and girls everywhere!! We real vampires fans love badassity not legitimized god-mods and Mary-Sues written by a fan-girl who admits to doing no prior research on vampire legends. That is why when the Twilight fad fades into non existence, we will still be talking about Nosferatu, Dracula, and of course Lestat.
I think an MMORPG based in a Hellsing like setting would be best for all fans. If it was set around something like Ultraviolet or Underworld, then it would just turn away the girls. And if it was set more like Bram Stoker's Dracula or something mysterious and romantic then it would just be boring.
As a girl gamer, I can tell you what really pisses us off about RPGs and turns us away is how girls are portrayed, not the games itself. Take the zombie games for example or the game I am currently playing called Phoenix Dynasty. The girls are always shown wearing slutty, impractical outfits that expose a lot of skin and protects very little while the guys are always shown in cool armor and stylish hunting gear. Since only girls play the girl characters and I'm certainly not a lesbian, why would I want to spend several hours staring at the barley covered ass of another girl? (in ref to first person pov) Also there is the personality of the story line RPG characters. The girl is always either weak or needs to be rescued. Always! Take Final Fantasy for example. Even in the one game where the main character was a girl, she had to be rescued several times! (I'm talking about FFVI, not including X-2 or the more recent one, whatever it's number is)
In short, this is a girl-gamer's opinion on a vamp MMO. BTW don't believe me on Twilight? Check out this vid which shows how creepy Eward seems when paired with a practical girl. It is also a very funny and well made video lol. www.youtube.com/watch
Originally posted by LtJohnnyRico:
"I have one. "Why haven't they..." First topic?
Why haven't they fired you as a writer yet? You're by far the worst addition to MMORPG.com and even though I will probably be banned for that statement, I stand by it. A vampire MMO? Really!? REALLY!? A mage? Really!? REALLY!? A sorcerer!? A SORCERER!? A cyclops!? A CYCLOPS!? (This is pretty fun, and I'm starting to build momentum so hold on, ride's almost over) A troll!? A TROLL!? Yep. It's a troll. No, really. Uh oh! ZOMG!!! The TROLL is transforming... into a... TOOL!!! Wow, much like a butterfly, but without the charm or a set of wings. Perhaps you'll level up before your FLAME burns out... I'm trying different puns to seem humorous but it's just not working.
It's bad enough that I have to deal with my 12-14 year old students convinced that vampires are real because of garbage like Twilight, Vampire Diaries, True Blood, etc. It's ok to have fantasies but to feed this continual delusion of vampiric beings just to profit off the insanity of youth is another thing. This industry does not crave a new audience, it craves a unique world that does not promise everything and fail to deliver on anything. The MMO community has burned itself out on investing time, fandom, money, and patience into developers that only seek to get World of Warcraft-like returns off something with minimal work on their part.
There is an audience for vampires but the MMO community is not that audience. If we were, a developer would have already made such a game. Perhaps I will eat some crow when the new Whitewolf MMO comes out but until then, I think it will be an abysmal failure. I know MMO players good sir, and MMO players are not teenage girls getting goofy romantic over the idea of someone biting their neck in the dead of night."
Wow... you teach 12-14 year olds and yet you act like an infant? I guess this is your idea of role playing. Hmph... I'll bite.
While I agree - as even Dana has - that he needs some new material, his previous topics haven't been so transparent, especially considering tools like you are throwing your disgust into the mix. As a writer, one looks forward to such jolts; it allows one to know that he/she is being heard. And Dana isn't, by any means, a bad writer. Do people come to your teaching grounds and berate you for your method? OK, but do they do so in front of thousands upon thousands of people in a completely invasive manner? They do? Anyways, I find Dana's topics to be refreshing and comprehensive, unlike the praddling nature of your post enclosed in a box above mine.
Take this topic as an example: vampires, while probably not being YOUR thing, provide a very provocative lore for people - both younger and older (some people being over 3,000 years old!) - to "sink their teeth into". Sure, you feel some hate towards Stephanie Meiers (or whatever her name is; the T-word writer) and the copycats that have followed in her footsteps. I know I do. But you should also realize that the vampire culture or counter-culture or subculture - whatever you prefer - is larger than the MMO industry as a whole. The other day, I saw on the news that there are MILLIONS of vampires throughout the entire world! According to their spokesperson, a female who's name escapes me, they enjoy living amongst humans because... and my mind just trailed off.
Back to the topic: you rant on the fantasy of vampires belonging to adolescent females, but you lack depth or any sense of rhetoric in your dictation. Also, the INDUSTRY doesn't crave "a unique world that does not promise everything", the community does. The industry (those who develop and/or produce the games) are the people holding this genre back while looking for newer audiences (ahem WoW) to control. Call them noobs. Call them what you will. They're coming. New generations will continue to rise and fall within the MMO community, your students included.
I'm jumping around here, but I'm half asleep so where was I? Oh, you said, "but to feed this continual delusion of vampiric beings just to profit off the insanity of youth is another thing", and my reply to that is, "Uh, you could've just said MMO?" Still not getting the picture?
What's your MMO of choice? Sci-fi? Fantasy? Sci-fi Fantasy? Mine are more realistic, like Second Life and Boner Child (not yet out, I'm still trying to shop that title around to developers) Don't be an idiot. Save that for people like myself who have nothing better to do than to sound completely ridiculous at the risk of losing any credibility as a writer.
And in closing, either you stand in the back of class, anxiously awaiting the release of the 3-D remake of UO; or you hop on this fancy bangwagon we have here and enjoy the ride into the future. Also, some of what I said makes sense, so take that and write it down, copy it, stick the copy in a time capsule, bury it in your backyard (or, if you're too lazy/busy, don't bury it at all) so that someone else can achieve a higher knowledge.
The World of Darkness is just an amazing IP. I really hope CCP does it justice. But then, EVE is a pretty amazing game for what it tries to be, so I feel confident that WOD will be equally well-conceived. At least I think it will be if they include mages and faeries and werewolves and vampires all together.
Ah vampires... I like where Dana was going with the two different dimensions of time, but one could be saved as an expansion to the first to add future intrigue into the game. Personally, I'd like to see a vampire MMO where the ancient Asian stylization is mixed in with it. They were more beastly in every sense, so they could play a good opposition to the other vampires; could make for a stellar boss fight too.
And playable classes or professions... whatever:
Oooh, who remembers Monster Squad??? Hmmm... a Monster Squad MMORPG...
BTW, the Twilight reference was gay. I know of several females who HATE the books and haven't even bothered to watch the movies, yet love the vampire lore. Of course, they're not under 21, so that could be reason enough.
Long live the peoples proletariat!
Am very hopeful about the World of Darkness! It could be absolutely brilliant!
In reply to RoosterNash:
Monster Squad? o_O? Sadly I've never heard of it. Wiki Time!
Asian stylization? Good idea. Werewolves and Warlocks? Why? We want Vampires lol not a games loosly revolving around all the monster myths. If we add Werewolves and such, others woud ask for witches (you know, the female warlocks
), Zombies, Demons, and anything else that they can think of. Instead the game could have:
As for Twilight, I have noticed it's entire fan base is mostly girls between the ages of 12-14. As such, those poor deprived children did not grow up with Buffy, Angel, Blade, and Interview WaV, and other vamp badass-ness that we had. Those poor unfortunate children have had to choose between Underworld and Twilight (And I think some parents may forbid Underworld lol) I'm very upset with how Dana blamed Vlad the Impaler for Twilight. While Vlad may have inspired Dracula, He was a real person who made his way into history by being a merciless warlord who tortured the poeple he conqured inhumanly:
"His method of torture was a horse attached to each of the victim's legs as a sharpened stake was gradually forced into the body. The end of the stake was usually oiled, and care was taken that the stake not be too sharp; else the victim might die too rapidly from shock. Normally the stake was inserted into the body through the anus and was often forced through the body until it emerged from the mouth. However, there were many instances where victims were impaled through other bodily orifices or through the abdomen or chest. Infants were sometimes impaled on the stake forced through their mother's chests. The records indicate that victims were sometimes impaled so that they hung upside down on the stake."
Yeah, I don't think Stephanie Meyers had that in mind when she thought of Edward. . . . . . .
Actually I like the idea of adding werewolves. Could just be because of Underworld but it does break things up a bit.
However, unless something drastic (meaning "different") is done, these mmo's just don't really work as far as capturing tension and mood. Heck, even in LOTRO, where they had a session play where you relived Durin's bane (I think that's it), it didn't work.
The clunkiness of the avatars and the animations just got in the way.
Because what will end up happening is that you will have some sort of inn or city area and everyone, werewolves, vampires, humans, etc, just jumping up and down on things, dancing in the square and shouting LFG caves of innsmouth, must be lvl 17+.
Or each faction/group will be separated and it will just be one group or another "pwnign" the other group or, er "other" and then doing emotes on their bodies.
Part of what makes the horror genre work is mood, ambience, tension, storytelling, etc.
It's part of what made Vampire: Masquerade so good. I believe anyone who played that game and who experienced the haunted hotel chapter would know what I mean.
Now imagine that same hotel and players running around, zerging mobs and dueling in the hall ways.
Not cool. not cool.
The dev's would have to do something that was a bit more storybased and that mitigated a lot of the mmo nonsense that mmo's seem to suffer from. And I can't wait to hear those complaints. "its' not an mmo because I'm not on the screen with hundreds of other players."
Well, they either want bone chilling horror drenched in atmosphere or hundreds of players jumping up and over renfield as an e-sport.
now THAT'S horror!
*sigh* I can handle this one for Stephanie Meyers:
Although vampiric lore has existed in all forms around the world for thousands of years, the role of Vlad led to the creation of the vampire Dracula, widely considered to be the basis for modern vampire fiction. So we have a lil progression like this:
Vlad - Dracula - modern vampire fiction - Tada! Twilight! - Robert Pattinson's Fame
So, like any old chain that is usually in existence, we can remove Vlad and this happens:
Vlad- Null - Null - Null -Null - Hey! Robert is getting laid a lot less!Hm....points to ponder!
There's no way of telling whether a vampire MMO would be successful or not. I mean, I had high hopes for Matrix Online and look how that turned out. I liked VtM: Bloodlines as a single player game, so if there was even a little bit of what made that good, I'd probably go for it. What would probably make it bomb would be the community. Most of the people that are into vampires are... well... I've seen Vampire LARPs in action so maybe I'm just assuming the worst.
Anyway, vampires alone is probably too general. A supernatural MMO with vampires, werewolves, and... whatever else there is as the races or factions might actually work a little better.
Actually there's already a vampire mmo, it's called Dark Eden. It was released way back in 1997 in Korea. The game was actually pretty good too.
First, despite what some folks have been saying, I like these Why Not discussions. Are they all awesome? No. But all it takes is for one reply to one idea to creep into the mind of a developer and it could change the way we MMO forever.
To answer the Why Not:
Because this is EATING PEOPLE. Not whacking on them with swords. Or shooting at them with guns. EATING.
As soon as word of this got out, the crazies would turn off their GTA-IV, pick up their religious book of choice, and get all kinds of angry over the devil worshipping cannibals. They already get all sorts of mad when its just in books, but you're actually going to let people "become" soul twisted vampires and raging werewolves and not expect the conservatives to show up en masse?
OR, the game gets censored so much that you end up with a fighter/wizard/cleric game and "Vampire" thrown into the title somewhere, ala World of Vampirecraft.
I agree. It would nice to have a good PvP faction-based MMORPG with more than 2-3 factions. WoD would be perfect for that.
If it would have good faction based PvP it HAS to be 3 factions. 2 doesn't work.
I have one. "Why haven't they..." First topic?
Why haven't they fired you as a writer yet? You're by far the worst addition to MMORPG.com and even though I will probably be banned for that statement, I stand by it. A vampire MMO? Really!? REALLY!?
It's bad enough that I have to deal with my 12-14 year old students convinced that vampires are real because of garbage like Twilight, Vampire Diaries, True Blood, etc. It's ok to have fantasies but to feed this continual delusion of vampiric beings just to profit off the insanity of youth is another thing. This industry does not crave a new audience, it craves a unique world that does not promise everything and fail to deliver on anything. The MMO community has burned itself out on investing time, fandom, money, and patience into developers that only seek to get World of Warcraft-like returns off something with minimal work on their part.
There is an audience for vampires but the MMO community is not that audience. If we were, a developer would have already made such a game. Perhaps I will eat some crow when the new Whitewolf MMO comes out but until then, I think it will be an abysmal failure. I know MMO players good sir, and MMO players are not teenage girls getting goofy romantic over the idea of someone biting their neck in the dead of night.
SUCK ROCKS AND BITE ME !
Meh. I'm not at all convinced that you need 3 or more factions. You just need the right systems in place in the game.
Oh no, now you want a game that men and women equally enjoy? When will people learn that you can’t cater to all tastes in one MMO? Nobody expects us to all play one solo game on our PC’s do they or watch only one genre of film? But for the world of MMO’s they all must suit the taste of every demographic, which is why they are so bland and conformist.
But if you wanted to try this here is what I would do. The guy part of the MMO is an FPS slasher, think DAoC on blood steroids, vampire clans at war sort of thing. The girl part is the MMO questing, emotion loving section. Oh…would that not be better as two separate games? Yes, so let’s stop trying to fuse all tastes into one horrible MMO ice cream.
Dana has hit on a real issue though, women do buy more things than men, and I will add that teenagers will buy more in their hobby areas than adults. This is distorting our society, both culturally and to the world of MMO’s. As the world becomes marketed only for women and youngsters.
Need a new premise Dana? Write an article called ‘a handful of new titles, which is the one for you”, follow that up with ‘a handful of old titles, what’s new and which one is for you’. Or get some inside beef from some MMO companies, they must be falling over themselves to tell staff writers their dreams and vision.
Directed towards posters
Zomg. I can't belive all this Twilight pro/con! It's a chick flick movie f kring out loud! And wow it had vampires in it. Deal with it! Want another movie that had vampires? Lesbian Vampires Killers! Are you gonna suggest making a mmo after that too? (yes i watch shaite movies as a hobby)
Back on the topic
I Would LOVE a vampire mmo. But it will never be truly a vampire mmo, more like a mmo that gives u the possiblity to play a vampire.
We allready have a precedent in a very successful game that was sucessful - Vampires The Masquerade but not bloodlies that was kinda crap ... try Redemption!
You have the vampire clans (factions), you have conflict (between clans and between vamps and other monsters) and ofcourse you can have romance. I seen romance happening in WoW so i belive it will deffinetly happen in a Vampire game :D
You could play as a human (with embracing options) a werewolf (shapeshifting options) or a vampire (with no options :)), i mean who needs options as a vampire :P)
You could go for a multi timeline game with the possibility to advance through time by sleeping(vamps) hibernating (werewolfies) or offsprings (humans ) like first play in the medieval age then go for the 1700s - 1800s victorian kinda era and then go hardcore in the present day
You could visit and play in the same places in different eras and the best thing is the game developers don't have to invent a world! They allready have it for the taking. History! It gives you whatever you need! They can add countries and wars and whateer they want. And the whole ideea would be to make the perfect sand-box mmo.
I'm just saying .. it could happen. It takes a lot of vision and a lot of understanding from the fanbase in order to work but i could happen.
Crunch on that.
PS : I think the what ifs are excellent Dana. If it wasn't for what ifs humanity would still be living in caves.
*sigh* I can handle this one for Stephanie Meyers:
Although vampiric lore has existed in all forms around the world for thousands of years, the role of Vlad led to the creation of the vampire Dracula, widely considered to be the basis for modern vampire fiction. So we have a lil progression like this:
Vlad - Dracula - modern vampire fiction - Tada! Twilight! - Robert Pattinson's Fame
So, like any old chain that is usually in existence, we can remove Vlad and this happens:
Vlad- Null - Null - Null -Null - Hey! Robert is getting laid a lot less!Hm....points to ponder!
You missed the point. Saying Vlad is responsible for Twilight is like saying Anchient Rome is responsible for Harry Potter.
Rome invades England - Legends of Arthur and Merlin pop up - Tada! Random person spontaniously decides to make a book about wizards and it MUST be Rome's fault since it mentions Merlin's name and wizards CAN'T exist otherwise! *Le Gasp!* Hmm point to ponder!
Vampire Legends existed long before Stoker showed up and none of them had to do with Vlad the Impaler. He is actually Vlad III named after his father Vlad II aka Vlad the Dragon (Dracul). Vlad III was named Dracula *Draculea* Literaly: Son of Dragon. He was later called Vlad Trepes because of the impalments, Trepes = Impaler.
"Recent research suggests that Stoker actually knew little about the Prince of Wallachia. Some have claimed that the novel owes more to the legends about Elizabeth Báthory, a 16th century Hungarian countess who allegedly murdered hundreds of her servants." - Miller, Elizabeth Dracula: Sense & Nonsense
The only reason Bram Stoker used his name was because he needed someone famous (or infamous) with a bloody past, from Europe to set his book. If he had chosen to use Alexander the Great for his character name, would you blame him for Twilight too?
The REAL man responsible for Twilight.
I get what you're saying but when I think of a Vamp MMO I think of the anime/manga Hellsing. It has a war-ish atmosphere and it has two opposing sides. It could be like the Modern Vampire version of WoW! :D And it would be so cool to explor 3-D European cities and such!
Who's in the picture being blamed for Twilight?
I would love a vampire/werewolf MMO. I don't think Vampires or Werewolves are in a decline, They have been around far to long to be considered fads.
The awesome dude in the picture is no other than Bram Stoker of course. Pour soul would probably turn in his grave if he knew of E. Cullens lol.
I used to like Vamp vs Wolf too but it's getting kinda old and lame. It seems like nothing these days can be pure Vampire or pure Werewolf without interference from the other.
Like the Power Rangers, it had it's shining moment in the spotlight of fame but now it has gotten old. If they make an MMO about Vamps, I want it to be Vamp only with some humans (Vamps gotta eat lol) Because there just isn't enough Vamp awesomeness in this world. If it's not Werewolves they get put with some other magical monster or demon.
Why can't we just have Good Vampires vs Bad Vampires? Angel vs Spike? lol
Uh - what?
Hmmm, wolves ...
www.apple.com/trailers/universal/thewolfman/
Uh - what?
When Power Rangers first came out everyone was all: "Ooh!" "Ah!" "Greatest kid show EVERY!" and every kid wanted to be a ranger for Halloween. but now when you mention Power Rangers people are like: "That show sux!" "Lame!" "Stupid plot and crappy special effects!" I think it came out in '92 or '93.
There is a free one with really old looking graphics, reminds me of Diablo, its called Dark Eden
From what info is publicly available, Funcom seems to make more progress with their "The secret world" than CCP is doing with "World of Darkness". I very much doubt that the World of Darkness is anywhere near an alpha phase, more likely to have some concept art produced at this point and that's it.
I enjoy roleplaying as much as the next guy but unless my daughter wanted me to play this with her there is no chance I'll be playing a game like this, it could though be a highly marketable strategy but it would be way too easy to feel the beach coming out in me if you know what I mean. Atleast when I play free realms with my kid there are no illusions about what it is with a vampire game that's supposed to be cool the trap would certainly be set.
The problem with a Vampyr MMO is that developers would be tempted to make something similar to Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines, and that was terrible enough as a single player game.
Terrible? That was pretty amazing as far as I'm concerned. I still remember having enjoyed playing it.
From what info is publicly available, Funcom seems to make more progress with their "The secret world" than CCP is doing with "World of Darkness". I very much doubt that the World of Darkness is anywhere near an alpha phase, more likely to have some concept art produced at this point and that's it.
Don't assume anything when it comes to CCP. We knew next to nothing about Dust514 a year ago now the game is one year from release.
"Yes master! Your wish is my command!" I ll RP a vampire's assistant for sure. I ll prepare the castle and kidnapp juicy virgins for my master while he sleeps at day. I ll clean the coffins and i will torture any aspiring Vampire hunter who dares to enter my realm.
But instead of this we ll get: "LFM for virgin hunting. No werewolves plz"...
Ive heard that people behind mmo EvE is working on a Vampire game.
Rumor has it that the theme will be from role playing books Vampire the Requiem and Bloodline ! ! They both are from community White Wolf.
I dont know If it`s true but it would be a very cool mmorpg game.
I always wanted a mmo "Vampire the Masquerade online"
well just to say it since I don't see anyone saying it(if so sorry I don't see it), it have a Vampire MMOalled Darkeden, its a old MMORPG who only have hacker now but it exist.
so Dana, not trying to be a prick but... I guess you should have search a little more, and guys twilight have a rule never mention it :P
CCP, the producers of EVE, have bought and are for quite some time now the owners of White Wolf, the makers of the world of darkness line of tabletop RPGs.
Yes Vampire the Masquerade would make a great MMO. 13 different clans and then on top of that you have different groups fighting each other and then the vampire hunters as well, not to mention werewolves...... it could work. I would play it if it was done well.
I realize Vlad was not a nice dude (heck, my education is in European History), but that was... a joke. After 533 years, I think it's OK to poke fun at him.
Vlad the Impaler. A generally terrible dude and arguably (although as others have said, there are dissenting views) the basis for Bram Stoker's Dracula. Who is, if you follow my attempt at humor's logic train, the reason we have so much modern vampire fiction, which includes Twilight.
Seriously, everyone gets upset at my history joke and no one bats an eye at my hockey joke on Tuesday? :P
www.ccpgames.com/company/merger.asp
"CCP hf. and White Wolf Publishing, Inc. today announced that the companies have entered into a definitive agreement to merge."
"The merged company will enable CCP to integrate White Wolf's leading expertise in offline gaming development to enhance and create physical products for its MMOG, EVE Online."
"White Wolf will leverage CCP's industry-leading technologies to bring its offline role-playing titles online. Conceptualization and early development has begun to bring White Wolf's World of Darkness, one of the world's strongest gaming properties, into the online world."
"The combined company will continue to operate under their respective names. White Wolf will be operated as a wholly-owned subsidiary of CCP."
www.ajc.com/business/content/business/stories/2008/12/28/video_games_georgia.html
"After the release of Eve Online’s expansion in March, the company will focus on creating another multi-player game based on the popular World of Darkness fictional universes created by White Wolf."
...There ya go. A company press release and a newspaper article confirming development of World of Darkness. And that's about all they've said, though one could infer that serious development didn't get underway until at least March '09 so they're probably wise to keep their mouths shut at this point. I wish more developers would do the same. Suffice to say CCP isn't rumored to be be developing a World of Darkness MMORPG, not only have they officially announced that they where, they frickin' OWN the IP.
Underworld may be an interesting spin : Vamps and werewolves and throw in some paramilitary to spicen things up.
Anyway, would this game be 90% at night? Or set in one of the distant North or South Pole for a 24 hr night cycle?
Anyways, a AAA Horror MMO would be a nice change.
Why not indeed. Simple matter is that CCP is currently creating a World of Darkness based MMO which includes the new version of the best pen and paper game of all time, Vampire: The Masquerade (Its current incarnation is Vampire: Requiem). Which means the question is honestly moot, its being done. Hopefully it will be done well with proper avatars instead of like EVE.
I'm a girl, and I love the Underworld series, but I hate Twilight.
Maybe the "Vampires for boys"/"Vampires for girls" pictures aren't totally accurate for some people..
I don't know, just a thought. :)
From what info is publicly available, Funcom seems to make more progress with their "The secret world" than CCP is doing with "World of Darkness". I very much doubt that the World of Darkness is anywhere near an alpha phase, more likely to have some concept art produced at this point and that's it.
Yes and no.
It is true that not even a website for the game is up yet, but on the other hand...The engine for the game is already being tested. The engine for EvE's walking in stations patch is the same engine they will be using in WoDo. I expect a website to be up when the patch comes out on EvE.
As for when the game comes out? It's been joked that it'll hit gold on Dec 24 2012.
www.wodonlinenews.net Keeps up with the scraps of info.
A long time ago I played a Vampire MMO called Bloodlust. I don't know if it still exists tho. It wasn't very popular at that time. But I did like it.
I know, and the body of the article says as much. Images usually are just jokes ;)
There will be a Vampire MMO coming soon. Vampire novels are very populare atm and the game would sell if it was done properly (good vs "evil") with few diffrent classes. Question is - what kinda settings should it be in ?
Well the thing is, Vlad/Dracula are still not the basis for modern vampire fiction. That would be Anne Rice's vamps. Even her stuff barely resembles the original vampire mythologies.
Also, I wouldn't come within 10 miles of a game that had "two" versions, one for "story and romance" and one for "killing." Is it really that hard to include both? Also not a fan of "good vs. evil"... no one is pure good or evil, and being given only one choice or the other without a few middle-ground or morally-gray options would be no different from regular MMOs with only one choice.
Oh, and what's with? "(And yes, I do know CCP is doing World of Darkness, but since we have no idea what exactly that game will be like, I'm choosing to ignore it for today!)"
Your actually going to just toss out a key fact that invalidates the discussion in order to make the discussion work?
Seriously WTF?
Vampire MMOs are still a completely valid discussion. Yes, CCP is making it, but as there is not much we can talk about with specific regards to that game, I figured I'd acknowledge its existence to try and avoid the "CCP is making WOD!" posts, which clearly didn't work.
I don't think the fact that one company is doing it (and one company did one in 1997) invalidates the entire debate. And I'm pretty confident WoD is nowhere near what I outlined in this article.
Twilight would suck(no pun intended) as an IP for an MMORPG. I'd have to go with Vampire:the Masquerade as my choice. Either that or Anne Rice's version. Of course Underworld would make an interesting game world, but it isn't to far from V:tM so it would probably work just as well.
Oh and your pictures you chose for Vampires for Girls and Vampires for Boys...are you serious? I can see the guys on this forum doing facepalms because Twilight is not all that popular with guys as it is with us females(though do not put me in with the females that like Twilight please - at least not the movies). ^_^
Mage: The Ascension mmo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Good luck transfering the actual magic system with that one, system thats's effectively entirely free form. :)
Good idea but please, make it sandbox, player driven economy and good lore and depth.
I wouldn't like to become a linear, level system, instanced dark vampire of the fu**ing hell of the inferno from the abyss of times and blah & doing stupid quests.
I would love to see a good vampire MMO, but expect we'd probably get some version of "Twilight" , "Buffy", or "Lost Boys" instead, where the vampires are "kewl doodz" teenagers with superpowers.
Would be nice to see a vampire MMO in the "vein" of "Dark Shadows" or the old Hammer films. After all, if vampires can be centuries old, would they not act more mature and cultured, and not zip around on skate boards and posing as"kewl doodz"?
Maybe the answer would be "Mature" servers that cost an extra $8 or so per month. Would separate the "Buffy's" from the "Barnabas's". (And this tactic could be the answer to community problems in any MMO; I'd pay extra to play on a mature server.)
At this point I think all of us are ready for something different than a typical fantasy MMO. I like your vampire idea, especially the moral choices and alternate solution to problem aspect. I hope the World of Darkness MMO turns out like this!
Don't know if it's been said:
Legacy of Kain
*Amazing, rich lore (with hopefully, equally well written dialog)
*The battle between the Vampires, The Hilden, and Saraphan is prime material for a DAoC-ish Trifecta
* Kain and Raziel voice overs please!
This actually has more potential material than WoW did with the Warcraft games before it, if you think about it.
Ironically, despite me actually being a HUGE LoK fan, I'm strictly against it being made into an MMO. Why? Mainly because previous games, although they have given us quite an insight into the world of Nosgohth, it's factions and other things, have remained very story centered and have made use of few characters, but have in exchange explored these characters to unbelievable details.
That's the "problem" with LoK, at least when it comes down to exploring the idea of turning it into an MMO - it's too focused on already existing characters and their stories (and... you know, it deals with time travel and you don't mess with that) aka. it's basically impossible to introduce some random characters (our PCs, that is) and have them actually matter something or contribute anything sensible and useful. Perhaps if the game was situated during some alternative timeframe (for example, in the early days of Kain's rule or something), maybe.
Unless Ann Rice or Whitewolf releases their creator rights... Good luck on making something original involving vampires. Whitewolf and Ann Rice covered everything and in details.
Twilight?
Sorry, that story is basicaly a laugh at human standards. Think about it... an OLD 100+ man with a 16 year old girl. I'm sorry but are we saying that if a 90 year old guy somehow found a way to look young and cute, he could go around and date teenagers? Is that what we're saying? Last i've checked, a granpa with a young girl is wrong... I guess we are blinded by looks.
Also the fact that these vampires don't die by good old sunlight?
True Blood – Well, True blood is basicaly what Vampire the Masquerade is but once the masquerade is lifted lol. Bill is a good Ventrue that once in a while gets a visit of fellow Brujah lol…Though, don’t get me wrong, it’s a great show and I’m glad they inspired themselve from Whitewolf or Ann Rice.
The issue though is that game wise, it’s hard not to copy world of darkness. It’s basicaly the best structure out there and since Whitewolf covers pretty much EVERYTHING, it’s hard to come up with something original now our days. I've played table top and did many live games when I was much younger and got to play through these books, mages, werewolves, vampires...
Legacy of Kain is pretty original though and it could certainly do well as an MMO. Then again, girls would be vampires and guys would all take soul reavers lol...
As for the female audience well you have to remember that some of the early vampire stories were all about the beauty and the beast. Granny loved it, mom loved it and now 16 year old emo/goth teen is loving it. From the get go, Vampire stories were made to appeal both sex.
Vampires are also the elves of world of darkness lol… seriously. The pretty people.
You are? Why?
The original Vampire the Masquerade lent itself very well to the kind of play your talking about. In fact I always the the Pen and Paper system lent itself better to RP than G. The whole point of the Clans in VTM was that it accomodating all of the Vampire archtypes in a single product. You had the Venture- faggy Anne-Rice types, and the Toreador who are even worse. And then you have the Max Schrek type Nosferatu, the animalisti Gangrel, and the Brujah who like yelling and breaking stuff... and at that's without even making the Sabbat clans playable. My point is within World of Darkness, you can do Twilight (well, except for the Sparkling) and Interview with a Vampire or just as easily 30 Days of Night and From Dusk till Dawn.
WoD is the PERFACT IP for the kind of game your describing, and CCP didn't licence it... they fricken OWN it.
The reason you failed to avoid "CCP is already making World of Darkness" comments is because you simply can't have this conversation without them.
Of frickin course Vampire MMOs are a valid discusssion, but World of Darkness is every bit as important a part of Vampire pop culture as Twilight is and you can't throw out the fact that a popular MMO developer FRICKEN MERGED with the company that created World of Darkness and accept to have a valid conversation about Vampire MMOs.
I can see your concern, but I beg to differ on one small point. There is a lot of gaps in the lore that an MMO could fill nicely.
There is little if any exploration of the war that exterminated all of the vampires except for Kain, up until the assaination of Ariel and cumbling of the pillars.. LoK 1, I think touched on it (Not sure, haven't played it in quite some time), but not much. In Soul Reaver 2, I think it was, when Raziel fights himself, it was drawing to a close.
Where was the war? Where were the Hilden in all of this? Who did all the killing? Or even better, go to the time period revealed in the temples in SR2 on the paintings on the wall, where the Soul Reaver was eventually forged. Before the vampires defeated the Hilden.. Surely humans must have existed in that time period, but it never explicitly says they did.
While I agree, using characters directly derived from the canon might have issues, but certainly, in all of Nosgoth, from the time of the war between the Hilden and the Vampires, or the Vampires and the Sarafan, there must have been a lot of nameless soldiers in that war.
Wanting Kain and Raziel voiceovers? That's my selfish part. They have awesome voices behind them that I'd make just about any excuse to hear again.
Joymax, the Korean MMO company that has been dominating the VERY Profitable FtP with Cash Shop world with it's SilkRoad Online game has also had a Vampire MMO out for over 3 years, Darkeden. It is VERY buggy, has a small fanbase that tolerates the bugginess and evidently spends enough in Joymax's cash shop to keep the servers open. Read the game forums.... ROFLMAO.
I agree with alot of the posts here, I mostly agree with
"I would love to see a good vampire MMO, but expect we'd probably get some version of "Twilight" , "Buffy", or "Lost Boys" instead, where the vampires are "kewl doodz" teenagers with superpowers.
Would be nice to see a vampire MMO in the "vein" of "Dark Shadows" or the old Hammer films. After all, if vampires can be centuries old, would they not act more mature and cultured, and not zip around on skate boards and posing as"kewl doodz"?
Maybe the answer would be "Mature" servers that cost an extra $8 or so per month. Would separate the "Buffy's" from the "Barnabas's". (And this tactic could be the answer to community problems in any MMO; I'd pay extra to play on a mature server.)"
But a MMO of this type will not work because.
1) THERE WILL NOT BE ANY OPEN PVP. No MMO todate has had a successful open world pvp system with a large following.
2) SEX SELLS. The hole idea behind a good Vampire movies is because of blood and sex scenes. This game will need to be adults only to handle the R rating it will need to be successful. This will decrease your market by a large number and making of it will be a hard to sell to the people with money.
3) VAMPIRES NEED TO SLEEP. In all the MMOs that I have played, you don't need to sleep, stop, rest, or just stay inside for two threds of the day. If you make a Vampire MMO with Human that Hunt VAMPIRES you will need to make your Vampires stop moving around diring the day light hours.
4) DEATH. What will you do to Vampires and or Humans to make them fill like diing is bad?
5) FEEDING. How do you cover that, what do you do to make a player NEED TO FEED on blood?
But if the devs can cover these points then thay have the makings of a good MMO.
You are? Why?
The original Vampire the Masquerade lent itself very well to the kind of play your talking about. In fact I always the the Pen and Paper system lent itself better to RP than G. The whole point of the Clans in VTM was that it accomodating all of the Vampire archtypes in a single product. You had the Venture- faggy Anne-Rice types, and the Toreador who are even worse. And then you have the Max Schrek type Nosferatu, the animalisti Gangrel, and the Brujah who like yelling and breaking stuff... and at that's without even making the Sabbat clans playable. My point is within World of Darkness, you can do Twilight (well, except for the Sparkling) and Interview with a Vampire or just as easily 30 Days of Night and From Dusk till Dawn.
WoD is the PERFACT IP for the kind of game your describing, and CCP didn't licence it... they fricken OWN it.
The reason you failed to avoid "CCP is already making World of Darkness" comments is because you simply can't have this conversation without them.
Of frickin course Vampire MMOs are a valid discusssion, but World of Darkness is every bit as important a part of Vampire pop culture as Twilight is and you can't throw out the fact that a popular MMO developer FRICKEN MERGED with the company that created World of Darkness and accept to have a valid conversation about Vampire MMOs.
Oh, sorry, I may not have been clear. Of course WoD is a valid discussion. I meant posts saying "you suck, you forgot WoD," which I failed to avoid, despite acknowledging it. I didn't forget WoD, but I don't think the fact that someone is doing that IP invalidates any debate about a vampire MMO as some others have posted.
The point of my article was larger than "what will WoD be" and that's the debate I tried to start. WoD is a part of it, no doubt, but there is far more to it than just one game.
As to WoD being what I describe, maybe they will, but as I said, I doubt it (specifically the female oriented, dual story line stuff).
If a dev. would like my money, they need to make it P2P game.
I know you're trying to troll, but honestly, I agree. This was pretty close to the bottom of my "why not" barrel for now ;)
...I'm likely going to adopt a new premise in the coming weeks.
Anyone got any suggestions? ;)
a million ideas how to make whats already out there better. When I first conceived of the idea of MMORPG back in 1994, while playing muds and playing DnD, I imagined something vastly different than WoW.
VAMPIRE MMO -
To capture Male + Female, you'd need to offer different types of vampires...include their origins as part of the story.
1)Ann Rice - Vampires are immortal, tied by bloodline. If the parent burns, then child burns. Origin is by demonic possession of the original, then passed down through Rice's turning ceremony. They have their unique weeknesses. Vampires are sterile.
2)Twilight - first off, shut up about not liking twilight. Don't play the vamps based on them. Thing is, lots of the GIRLS do like them. I'm in UT, the center of the twiligh vortex. Aside from being "sparkly" the rest of the idea about where they came from and their powers is quite unique and very cool. If you haven't read the books, then you wouldn't understand. Every mortal has a strong personal trait...when turned into a vampire of this lineage, that power is unlocked. These vampires are immune to sunlight, but not fire. And they're painfully obvious in sunlight. -100% stealth in the sun. Can have half vampire children...very rare.
What other kinds? That are a million to choose from.
Vampire hunters factions. - again, a million archetypes here: The religious right, anti demon, buffy vampire slayer, crusading paladin types.
neutral factions - willing to work with "good vampires' or whatever.
Werewolves - a MUST in a vampire mmo storyline.
Wizards and witches - also an integral part. where magic like vampires exists....so does magic of this type...at least in most vampire lore.
A "vampire MMO" and lore would be fun to make...writing the differente lores to work together would take effort, but creative people enjoy challenges of this type. I'd do it. :D
NEW IDEAS for DANA to write about?
Advanced physics in MMOs. Is there one out there? even the in development Star Wars new republic MMO still has clunky "MMO" physics.
How about, fast action (think LotR:The Return of the king) hack and slash + MMORPG. Does this exist anywhere? EVERY MMO thinks that you have to fight for 30 minutes per enemy. YUCK. Are there any fast action MMORPG's out there?
SciFi MMORPGS where you get to live in space, and actually see the inside of your ship + FPS style action. Is there one out there? Think, RoboTech or any one of those. SO much potential for personalized living space without cluttering precious landscape. So much capability for multiple game styles in one game. Flight Sim + FPS + RPG + Minigames, etc. Is there an MMO like this?
Yes, but in Brian Lumley's setting, the government run psychic special branch, the alternate earth (Starside/sunside). Basically all of the necroscope series and vampire wars rolled into one massive online pw.
Pulp horror at its best, perfect!
Edit: The female vamp's (called wamphyri) in these books are possibly the most aggressive creatures ever fictionallized. (The epitome of all sexually aggressive women in positions of power :P)
Originally posted by Tentaro
Yes Vampire the Masquerade would make a great MMO. 13 different clans and then on top of that you have different groups fighting each other and then the vampire hunters as well, not to mention werewolves...... it could work. I would play it if it was done well.
Originally posted by Xasapis
CCP, the producers of EVE, have bought and are for quite some time now the owners of White Wolf, the makers of the world of darkness line of tabletop RPGs.
Okey ! Somehow we know that something is cooking up. It can be a Very good base mmo.
World of darkness could be as well very cool game.!! Just thinking of it makes me smile.
Here is my thought !!?
-The game must have un obvious direction. What I mean by that is that
I don`t want to see enemy`s holding hands. That whats flop AoC.
It must be Good vs Bad ! The game should have a based experience level. But on a simulator!
I want my Avatar learn Kung-fu , I go to a secret Kung-fu school. In time my avater becume a kung-fu master.
He got all the time! Why ? Because his a freaking Vampire.!! The game should not be like other mmo.
The Game should not concentrate at level up fast like Wow. Then its only MMO and not RPG.
It should have society, clan vs clan. Player should know his boundary. But Signs on the streets etc.
Offcourse you should level up out side your society but not in term killing 15 ugly spiders and get xp.
When you out doing youre thing it should have a purpose. That makes the game stimulating.
"I have so much to say but I`m a bit worry that I exaggerate" But I do hope people understand what I just wrote.
True, but if I'm going to play a LoK game then I'd like it to be involved with the actual games that made me a fan of the series in the first place. I mean sure, in every setting there are these periods of history and important events which are left unexplored, entire eras even in LoK, but playing during those times which are so removed from the events of LoK games would be like playing in a game that has very loose connections with the source material... even name-only if pushed to extreme.
---
But putting that aside, I could see myself supporting True Blood-ish MMO which is, as someone has already pointed, out, somewhat WoD-lite with a lifted Masquerade. Actual WoD seems like a HUGE undertaking when it comes to actual MMO game, especially if they eventually plan to include every Sup out there (Vampire, Werewolf, Mage, etc) and even though it's CCP that's making it I still remain skeptical.
In my experience of trying to get women to play video games, it is never the content that is the issue(well most of the time anyway) but rather their lack of ability when it comes to hand/eye coordination. Basically they can't control the character well enough to get into the game and they don't want to take the time to learn how.
Not saying all women are this way, as I've raided with women in WoW. But OTHER women, those who don't play video games, at least from what I've witnessed, it always boils down to the controls.
Will a vampire mmo break this? IMO only if they make learning the controls like learning how to put make-up on. It has to appeal to how they learn.
I realize Vlad was not a nice dude (heck, my education is in European History), but that was... a joke. After 533 years, I think it's OK to poke fun at him.
Vlad the Impaler. A generally terrible dude and arguably (although as others have said, there are dissenting views) the basis for Bram Stoker's Dracula. Who is, if you follow my attempt at humor's logic train, the reason we have so much modern vampire fiction, which includes Twilight.
Seriously, everyone gets upset at my history joke and no one bats an eye at my hockey joke on Tuesday? :P
Okies Dana I'm sorry. I blame dark chocolate covered espresso beans for my brief lapse of humor.
Hockey joke? Where! Where! lol
You are a great big idiot! A great big Sexist Idiot! Of course a woman playing for the first time will have no coordination!
As a girl gamer, I can tell you what really pisses us off about RPGs and turns us away is how girls are portrayed, not the games itself. Take the zombie games for example or the game I am currently playing called Phoenix Dynasty. The girls are always shown wearing slutty, impractical outfits that expose a lot of skin and protects very little while the guys are always shown in cool armor and stylish hunting gear.
Since only girls play the girl characters and I'm certainly not a lesbian, why would I want to spend several hours staring at the barley covered ass of another girl? (in ref to first person pov) Also there is the personality of the story line RPG characters. The girl is always either weak or needs to be rescued. Always! Take Final Fantasy for example. Even in the one game where the main character was a girl, she had to be rescued several times! (I'm talking about FFVI, not including X-2 or the more recent one, whatever it's number is)
If sexy girls sell so well then why don't the guys use only the girl characters and leave the dudes to us? -_-#
I have to defend Dana here. He is my favorite writer on this site by far. You sir should be banned from this site since you are apparently unable or unwilling to treat others with respect. If you don't like vampire fantasy settings, thats fine, but there are a lot of us who do.
Furthermore, this site is for discussing games and game content. Its bad enough that we have hundreds of trolls everywhere bad-mouthing every game in existence. We don't need people making personal attacks in addition.
Do us all a favor and GTFO.
Okies Dana I'm sorry. I blame dark chocolate covered espresso beans for my brief lapse of humor.
Hockey joke? Where! Where! lol
The 5 MMO remakes
In the AC entry... :)
ROFL, this could totally be done with humor and fun.
Select your vampire origins:
"Sparkly but secretive, with a special gift"
"Coven-centric Hunter"
"Coven-centric Weapon Designer"
"Ancient, human killers"
"Flamboyant solo w/Henchmen"
"Full Wolf Xform"
"Man/Wolf (Lycan)"
etc... this could be done with humor and fun IMO. This way, everyone could play their best idea of a vamp, but with limits based on their selection, and of course pros and cons to each type.
Again, I can understand that, but there's lots of elements that tie back to the game that would feel like you're still in that same world, would allow for an MMO, and still not not break canon.
In the time before the Hilden where defeated, you can still involve some characters from canon, such as Yanos and Vorador (Human before becoming a vampire). All before the time of the Soul Reaver was forged.
In the time of the Sarafan war, Kain is alive and well, as are all characters, except Raziel and all of Kain's other lieutenants would still be humans under the command of Moebius. Lots of battles between those two factions, and if I'm not mistaken, In Legacy of Kain 2: Blood Omen, the Saraphan, Hilden, and Vampires were all in the same time period, so 3 factions could be an option.
IF (And that's a big "If") the developers could keep the characters actions and personalities strictly to as they are in the cannon (Perhaps major faction leaders you rarely interact with, like Thrall/Jania in WoW), the battles could go on between them, without the canon ever really being infringed upon..
Of course, this is all a pipe dream.. Don't think the writer of the LoK series even works at Eidos anymore. She left some time ago..
Ah well. Good discussion.
I'd play anything even remotely to do with the LoK series. I loved those games.
I agree. That would be frickin' awesome. There is also a LOT of lore in the LoK universe to build on. Seems like the perfect IP for a game like that.
I'm telling you Twilight is not a good idea. As I said earlier, when a 100+ old man goes out with a 15 year old girl. It's not an OK vampire world...
Btw, some of you might have missed the major Vampire the Masquerade Reset.. no?
White Wolf published a completely new vampire story and actually... a completely new World of Darkness story. It's not as good and I sometimes fear for CCP. They won't be using Masquerade or any other old settings.
You know, a bit like how D&D online used a realm that no one really cared about lol.
That's making EVE not in the New Eden space or WOW on Bungie island instead of Azeroth.
CO showed us instanced worlds (Crisis zones) what would be cool is if "evil" vampires had to live in their "dark" shard created by turning the daughter and "good vampires" were in the "light shard" same world. People with the same quest chain but their "seperate"
The speculation around the merger of Eve Online developers CCP and Vampire - The Masquerade publisher White Wolf was that CCP was going to do a vampire MMO. The inclusion of ambulation in Eve was thought to be so they could test out the graphics engine for the upcoming MMO. Now, a year or two later, ambulation still hasn't made it into Eve and you don't hear anything about a vampire MMO from CCP.
I am all for something other than a Tolkienesque/D&D based MMO. Been there done that... well... still doing that. :)
EDIT: Actually it was nearly three years ago when there was talk about CCP starting a vampire MMO.
"Conceptualization and early development has begun to bring White Wolf's World of Darkness, one of the world's strongest gaming properties, into the online world." -- http://www.white-wolf.com/vtes/index.php?articleid=629
I've been wanting to see an MMORPG based on the Underworld movies for quite some time... Rather that, than say Twilight, which I haven't read or seen, nor do I think I ever will.....
Meh. I'm not at all convinced that you need 3 or more factions. You just need the right systems in place in the game.
It would be nice at least to have the factions broken up some with different sects and stuff. Having only two factions makes for very little politics. Some may not care for that, but I think it could make a more interesting community.
If they picked the right vampire mmo then I think it could be very fun. For example Vampire the Masquerade would be a great source to pull from if you did a vampireish MMO. Yet there is so much vampire stuff out there that given vampire stuff a bad name that is can easily become a huge dud.
I agree. The developers or GMs would have to take an active role in fostering such a community to make it work. Otherwise it will just become WoW with fangs.
World of Darkness is a rather vast IP.
It has core books for :
Vampires
Werewolves
Hunters
Psychics
Mages
Changelings (think of all the fairy tales not related to the previous types and lump them together)
I haven't read the one on psychics, but all the other ones have clan/tribes/faction and plenty of in fighting plus fighting between types.
I Hope World of Darkness starts out with vampires, werewolves, and mages since they are the most popular, and concentrate on content, then add in the others as expansions with their own content later. I'm for three realm type+ pvp because it has better power struggle vs just 2 where one side more often than not has higher population and permanently stays on top on the server.
So I suppose you'd rather they'd have spent those years pre-maturely running their mouth ala Darkfall? Actually it was Dana Massey who posted an article about making that mistake just recently.
The WoDmmo would be nice, but would be the deathknell ot their LARP club... its been hit hard by the non vamp based MMOs as it is...
Why live action when you can sit at home and "really" play your character.... skuttlebutt is 2yrs out..
NO!
The entire vampire genre (games, movies, books, TV, freaking anything) needs to go away.
Ugh...so overdone, overrated, overhyped.
i've been waiting for a game to come out with this genre for a long time. White Wolf would be a good company to look at for ideas on how to design the game around Vampire the masquerade. But I would rather it be much like the idea of Underworld type atmosphere. That way you and have different clans of vampires vs. werewolves.
i'm all for it...
Isn't CCP working with White Wolf to do a Vampire MMO?
sorry to lazy to check the other 116 posts
I'm sure you would get a decent amount of girls involved in a Vamp MMO.
But as an old time pen & paper World of Darkness player I react this way "Vampire, Werewolves, Mages OH MY.... YAWN
10 years ago the genre was sweet now it's just DULL, at least for me anyway.
This. I'll be a hunter, ty. I'd love to PvP a bunch of "emo /wrist vamps" online in all their hot topic gothiness.
It'd give a whole new meaning to "corpse camping" wouldn't it? lol
Vampires, Werewolves, and Hunters would be a good start. Mages would take forever to work out right... the Paradox system would be awkward and never be balanced (though it'd be funny if the character abused the Time sphere and Wrinkle himself erased the character from the server as if it never existed lol!) If they did get it to work though, I'd love to be a part of Iteration-X, but any part of the Technocracy would be just fine.
Wraith or Changeling... Changeling could be worked in, but wraith would need a special touch to function with the rest.
All in all you could have one hell of a world... but lore would be a must, and time to do it right... I honestly don't think there's a big enough "Sandbox" out there to fit it all in.
If you are thinking about Masquerade as a MMO do remember that MMO’s can end up changing huge areas of the dynamic and rules of an IP. Take Star Treks’s no guild staffed star ship decision, it is Star Trek Jim, but not as we know it.
Same for a Masquerade MMO, who knows what would get changed or dropped to fit a MMO game design?
Keep in mind that, if WoD MMO ends up focused on vampires it's gonna be Requiem, not now dead and buried (pun time) Masquerade... which is a good thing in it's own right, mainly because CCP will be free of huge metaplot burden that was present in oWoD and it'll essentially give them free reign to craft their own version of WoD world.
The thing People who crow about 3 factions forget is that whilst the expectation is for the 2 weaker sides to team up & beat on the strongest what often happens is the 2 strongest team up to beat on the weakest, I saw this happen in DAoC quite a bit & being on the recieving end of that for too long forced many to just quit.
So 3 factions can be a blessing or a curse, I'd rather there were multi factions with some background story every so often encouraging some alliance, & some checks and balances, like some npc factions perhaps or npc "heroes" that join up with the weakest side to help them out when needed.
With that offtopic aside, I think the WoD is a great starting place for a MMO at least from a lore & factions starting place, but I also really enjoyed the lore surrounding the Legacy of Kain series.
I would love to see the game build its "zones" as "timezones", so you would be in the early middle ages for the starter zones & as you developed you would then move into zones of a later time, with the later zones being set in early 1900s & then as the game expanded it would add more in. But the "time curve" would be a bit higher as the game grew, so the first set of zones would be set in the 1000 -1500 era, the next in the 1500 -1750 era, then the 1750 - 1875, 1875 - 1925, 1925 - 1950, 1960, 1970, 1980, 1990, 2000, 2010 wherupon it expands into a global game and new zones add new cities, etc. Or something like that anyway.
I would love to see various factions of Humans, Vampires, Werewolves, Zombies, Demons etc though there could be something like 3 "arch factions" to which these could belong, Where you have alliances of good humans, good vamps good werewolves....but there could be splinter factions of for example Puritannical humans that will not ally with the "filth" of the other factions & seek to cleanse them from the globe.
The game would have PvE core with some PvP & the PvP would centre around instanced battlegrounds but these battlegrounds would be say a set of 10 from a possible 100+ around the "world" & every so many weeks the "battlegrounds" would shift to different areas.
But yeah I would love to see a well done Vampiric-MMO.
P.S. Fix the freaking forum so I can use apostrophes in IE8 already ffs.
I wouldn't play a MMO that was just dedicated to vampires but I would play a MMO that implemented vampires into its lore system, make vampire a race that you could pick in game & give that race a nice back drop & features to enhance the feel of being a vampire. Then you could work with that by giving human a class to pick from like vampire hunter or a class that allows transformation into a were-wolf, but a vampire only mmo would be kinda boring.
Wow, I didn't think a writer could be that stupid. There is a vampire MMO.
Its called Dark Eden.
Correct yourself, There is no SUCCESSFUL vampire MMO.
I would adore a good vampire MMO. Although make it a bit of a fight between vampires, lycans, and other evils. Nothing buffy like, but something more like Hellsing or Underworld.
Personally, I like the idea of the vampire mmo. But I'd like to see it from a different angle. I'd like to see more options available on parts to play. I love the idea of playing a beautiful girl who encounters a dangerous, yet strangely hypnotic "bad" guy. I've actually searched for this very thing prior to reading this article. Guys love to conquer and live it out through mmo's. Why not a game that appeals to woman's love of romance.
*shrug*
I suppose a little niche mmo catering to a woman's self destructive attraction to the idea of a 'bad boy' could be rather quaint however i think a different approach could do well. By this i of course mean the old pnp series Vampire the Masquerade. Still, i've no idea how you would begin to keep the flavor and turn it mmo at the same time...
While I'm not a huge vampire fan, I have to say, Dana, this is a brilliant idea. I despise Twilight from every depth of my soul, but vampires do take their root in romanticism. The two paths definitely need to be there. It would be tricky, but a big hit if done correctly. And it would need to be done now.
It would be nice to have a human faction as well so the PvPers can play as vampire hunters. That would make it an epic win. But the two paths of vampires alone would be a lot of work within itself.
I know you're trying to troll, but honestly, I agree. This was pretty close to the bottom of my "why not" barrel for now ;)
...I'm likely going to adopt a new premise in the coming weeks.
Anyone got any suggestions? ;)
Considering how badly the gaming community seems to hate every new MMO that comes out. And considering how many people these days say they want to play an MMO but really just want a solo game with a chat room. How about you contemplate the future of MMOs in general. You could title it "Why Bother". =)
You need to keep up with the times. World of Darkness is already making a Vampire MMO. How do you not know this? It will be the new Vampire (Requiem) . There are also rumors of a Twilight MMO. I bet vampires will have the sparkle ability. Also the thing about getting the female vampire fan? Won't happen unless the game has a big emphasis on story and most MMOs don't. It's just about kill this person, level up and get gold and loot. So unless other MMOs follow Biowares idea of the 4th pillar I can't see a Vampire MMO attracting the female vampire fan.
I would more likely play an MMO based on VtM rather than VtR. The Original World of Darkness was much more Fun.
I completely agree. I would pay a monthly fee to play in an MMO that was designed like Bloodlines =D
A vampire-centric game really would be great. As opposed to a Vampire (good) and Vampire (bad) game... why not offer a slightly more open game with more 'factions' involved? Vampire (good) vs Vampire (bad) vs Humans (vampire hunters) vs NPC/PVE (other supernatural forces, werewolves, changlings, humans of various types (some might be vampire slaves/protectors).
I think this could be done. I think it would have a chance... a very good chance, honestly.
The setting would be key, imho. Are we talking old world or current timeframe? Are we talking recreating our Earth and utilizing that?
Something along the lines of Vampire of the Masquerade would be quite cool.
...
Off topic... Whoever mentioned a Highlander game... could be cool. But if there 'can be only one'... how cool would it really be? I would see this as more of a FPS-ish game like Call of Duty. Each round you (team v team or every man for himself styles) you would simply fight until only 1 player was left alive. I mean, surely someone could manage to create a MMO out of this, and I would certainly look at it... but I'm just not sure how that would be done.
The vampire-genre just seems like 'low hanging fruit' at this point for some dev to come along and snatch up.
Oh no. No more Vampires please!
On the other hand... If there where other parties like werewolfs, dragons, tree-spirits, giant water snakes (all playable of course) or whatever has been invented in years of high fantasy it would be a nice thing apart form all this "Human, Elven, Dwarven vs. Villians" grind and yawn games.
No offence intended, but I wonder why some people freak out and go "aww, hell no!" when they hear about vampires in gaming media. Sure, there are some works out there that give vampires a bad name (primarily, Twilight and it's ilk), but actual video game vampires? I don't really recall them being all that bad (Vampire Rain, khm) or there actually being a whole lot of them, and in most cases they're good to average titles (Legacy of Kain, both Masquerade titles, Blood Rayne.... nothing really to run around and cry how bad it was).
So "sure" I say, bring them on, make ANY vampire game you can think of... I sure think we could use more of them.
I fear we would end up with a bunch female "characters" played by (male) "Lestats" sitting behind their keyboards, hehe.
I'm a female gamer and I would be interested in a vampire MMO. And yes, girls buy things cuz we dont have the time to grind. While I'm playing, dinner still needs to be cooked, laundry needs to be done...and my strong husband and child still are too weak to do them. So I get it all done...and tank the boss!
I would play a vampire MMO, actually if there is also a werewolf race a la Underworld would be great too
I would love anything that is not a copy of WoW.
Vampire MMO
Napolionic era war mmo
Agreed
I just don't think they can do this and make all the masses happy at the same time. They'll either do it all cheesy like or get the races wrong to 50% of the lore nuts.
World of Darkness MMORPG that's in development by CCP.
"Why Not" wait for that?
if there is a vampire mmo why do people think it would be based of twilight
Give me my WOD CCP and hurry it up!
(AAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHH Fires volley upon volleys of plungers in iceland)
I have one. "Why haven't they..." First topic?
Why haven't they fired you as a writer yet? You're by far the worst addition to MMORPG.com and even though I will probably be banned for that statement, I stand by it. A vampire MMO? Really!? REALLY!?
It's bad enough that I have to deal with my 12-14 year old students convinced that vampires are real because of garbage like Twilight, Vampire Diaries, True Blood, etc. It's ok to have fantasies but to feed this continual delusion of vampiric beings just to profit off the insanity of youth is another thing. This industry does not crave a new audience, it craves a unique world that does not promise everything and fail to deliver on anything. The MMO community has burned itself out on investing time, fandom, money, and patience into developers that only seek to get World of Warcraft-like returns off something with minimal work on their part.
There is an audience for vampires but the MMO community is not that audience. If we were, a developer would have already made such a game. Perhaps I will eat some crow when the new Whitewolf MMO comes out but until then, I think it will be an abysmal failure. I know MMO players good sir, and MMO players are not teenage girls getting goofy romantic over the idea of someone biting their neck in the dead of night.
You Sir are a D**k.
Vampires have for a long time been a great source of entertainment for many many people.
When you say "It's ok to have fantasies but to feed this continual delusion of vampiric beings just to profit off the insanity of youth is another thing." I am not too sure what you mean, do we not play games because we wish to be entartained??? If someone likes the whole Vampire genre it does not mean that they are in some sort of delusion.
If that were the case, there are a whole lot of people on these forums that believe they are wizards, warlocks, trolls, orks, elves and goblins. Your comments have little to no grounding in fact. I understand that this was probably an attempt at trolling but I could not let this go. You claim that you have "Students" which would suggest you are some sort of educator, if you truely believe that your students are (and I quote) "convinced that vampires are real because of garbage like Twilight, Vampire Diaries, True Blood, etc." then I feel sorry for you. Teenagers often have more idea about the real world than some of the adults I know.
I fail to understand how you could possibly teach these kids anything when you obviously have very little idea of what goes on in their minds.
Back to the topic at hand, I think a Vampire MMO could be just what this sometimes flailing industry needs.
I for one welcome new ideas just like this.
Honestly, that says more about those adults than teenagers.
Honestly, that says more about those adults than teenagers.
lol, agreed but my point still stands
Yes I too could find a few deranged adults, in a mental institution or something that know less about the world than a teenager.
Sorry but the only people who think that teenagers understand more about the world than adults tend to be teenagers or overly proud parents. :)
On this basis I would expect a ten year old to understand more about that world than a teenager? As you can see the argument falls rather flat. On the other hand the idea that teenagers think they understand everything when they don’t is blatantly obvious. Take Peaches Geldof for example, who understands the world better than anyone over the age of twenty.
As an older fella once said (sorry Peaches) “I am too old to old to know everything.” :)
If they would have done some research on this site they would have discover a topic from 2 years ago that discuss this already in lenght by community.
Massey again not original and come up with ideas thats already discussed by mmorpg.com community.
Oh and for idea that vampire games make more girls play is also just a gues i realy doub there will play more girls this kind of games.
"Peaches Geldof"
Until I looked this up, I was imagining the least appealing dessert ever.
You need to keep up with the times. World of Darkness is already making a Vampire MMO. How do you not know this? It will be the new Vampire (Requiem) . There are also rumors of a Twilight MMO. I bet vampires will have the sparkle ability. Also the thing about getting the female vampire fan? Won't happen unless the game has a big emphasis on story and most MMOs don't. It's just about kill this person, level up and get gold and loot. So unless other MMOs follow Biowares idea of the 4th pillar I can't see a Vampire MMO attracting the female vampire fan.
...paragraph 4.
If they would have done some research on this site they would have discover a topic from 2 years ago that discuss this already in lenght by community.
Massey again not original and come up with ideas thats already discussed by mmorpg.com community.
Oh and for idea that vampire games make more girls play is also just a gues i realy doub there will play more girls this kind of games.
We have over 1 million members and over 3 million posts. You cannot honestly expect that I've read every single one and cross check that before writing a new article? If you guys discussed it, awesome. Link it and maybe there are some posts in there that can add to the discussion, but you cannot expect us to be aware of every post on our forums.
I got your vampire for you: play a shadow priest in WoW =P.
But seriously, what is up with all the Twilight hate? I bet most of you who are bashing it haven't even read the books. All four of them, that is, the last one is the best. I once almost towed the same line, until my little sister got me to read them. Yes, my little sister. Also, if you are judging the books based on the movie, the movie sucked IMO.
IDK if I could play a vampire MMO for this reason: it would likely be PvP based, with very few traditional raid bosses. When was the last time you saw vampires team up to save the world?
Never. They are always fighting their own little wars: fighting some town of people they have taken one too many meals from, fighting each other, fighting werewolves, fighting some other species of undead. That is the perfect setup for PvP.
World of Darkness, nuff said
/agree
First of all the World of Darkness MMO being worked on could potentially be a strictly Vampire MMO since that was White-Wolfs first Table Top game they brought out and was easily the most popular of them.
Secondly its not really too far fetched to have an mmo vampire game, The Vampire game Masquerade and Requim from White wolf already show us a good number of "Vampire Classes" that people could play. All you would need to do is add a more in depth Talent tree to those Disciplines, decide what era the vampire game you wanted to play in, since as cool as it would be to have multiple era vampire servers for one game it sounds more like something that would be impractical.
Modern day would be fine as it would be fine although the idea of cars, trains, and other vehicles could be a problem. The Biggest problem would be that most vampire games in general are social games by nature, which MMOs fail at which is storyline driven games, its hard to make a story driven game for a million players and have it be unique to each and every one.
If it can be done and well it would probably redefine content in an MMO as we know it, sadly its a larger undertaking than I think we can comprehend.
Dark Eden was a vampire vs. slayers MMO. But its 2,5D and there should be a new one.
I have read this whole thread. I am waiting on WoD, and think that CCP having it is excellent. As far as 3 factions - From my experiences with Vampire TM - would there not, potentially be more than 3 Vampires, Werewolves, nad Hunters? Seems that the Vampire types were not that friendly to each other either and there could be great interaction there.
There is a series of books that has vampires, mages, werewolves, Fairies, demons, etc that could be a good base for a MMO. That is the Harry Dresden series by Jim Butcher. It even had a war with sides that were changeable. # vampire factions: White(sex), Red, and Black(the nosferatu, rotting corpse type). Just a thought.
However, I am eagerly awaiting WoD.
Vampire seems like more of an MMO class than a full game.
I mean...how would the skill sets work?
There is a vampire mmo, it's called Dark Eden, it's really old but if your a vampire fan it's worth checking out i guess. It's f2p and lots of pvp.
http://www.joymax.com/darkeden/
See Vampire the Masquerade. Vampire can most certainly be a full game. It's not a class. It's more like a race with classes specific to that race in Vampire the Masquerade and Vampire the Requiem.