EverQuest Next, p99, and on

[Kalex716]

Excellent post Calthaer! While the idea of emergent content isn't new in games, and is often a high priority at the design philosophy level, execution of those ideas has been extremely lacking in game dev at the feature level.

Your specific ideas are great, but at the same time extremely difficult to execute on. Telemetry and anayltics have come a long way to inform monetization and marketing models, and often helps inform development decisions... But I've never heard of a project leveraging it dynamically threw the product to drive content hands off, like you've outlined.

The first studio that comes out with content that revolutionary, will definitely find success.

[Calthaer]

Didn't say it would be easy, but I think it will have to be done for "massively" to succeed. One reason for the rise of the indie PC game scene in the last five years is the fact that the small studios are innovating to compete, while big studios are not - they're iterating (e.g., Madden 27 or whatever). "Massively" has historically focused on the technical challenge of connecting everyone at once, but that has been done and is old hat. Now they need to give people reasons to connect, and to keep connecting. More than just nostalgia - it has to not only be good at the start, but also show improvement over time. Blizzard is the last man standing, I believe, because they have a history of embracing change in their games for balance and fun, but even they are not changing fast enough.

Additionally, I think we have also seen "Small Multiplayer Online Games" replace "Massively" MOGs in terms of market demand in this space. Minecraft - where people can run their own server, just with their friends. Terraria has the same. In a way, Project 1999 and EQEmu is embracing that trend - lots of other little servers in that list with not a lot of people in them; have to wonder if some are run by a group of friends. Microsoft is the only one monetizing this fully with Minecraft Worlds, but I could see this changing.

Near-term I can foresee more products that create provincial experiences - tantamount to a Dungeons & Dragons "campaign" with a player-group, where the computer / system is the DM. "You and your small group of friends have your own world now" rather than "You (and everyone else) are in our world now." Mitigates the reasons not to do massive (trolls and other anti-social behavior, competition for resources, etc.) while maximizes the benefits (playing with friends).

[Llurendt]

Calthaer, you described a bunch of the same mechanics that I've been thinking about for making my 'ultimate' game. I've been thinking along those same lines for virtually every project I've worked on, game-related or not. Many projects ought to be modular, self-monitoring, and ultimately, self-regulating.

I'm a long way off from being able to actually accomplish something like this, but you certainly described some of how the features work better than I've been able to, so if you don't mind, I'll be copying your post into my design docs and using your ideas to help polish mine. [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

[applesauce25r624]

Originally Posted by Swish [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Historically, if it has "Online" as part of the title...it's going to be bad [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

even UO?

tell me where the bad pk touched you ;[

[Swish]

Actually hadn't thought of it, slightly before I had internets. Everything but UO [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

[jcr4990]

Originally Posted by Swish [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Historically, if it has "Online" as part of the title...it's going to be bad [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Nope

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[Furniture]

article is garbage

the author says about EQnext -"It was to be a resurrection of the golden days of slow burn gameplay, meaningful community, deep and expansive world making, and genuine long-term challenge."

EQNext was never going to be any of those things and only an idiot thought otherwise

[Swish]

Originally Posted by jcr4990 [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Nope

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Never heard of it, and neither had you before you googled it.

[Llurendt]

Originally Posted by Furniture [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

article is garbage

the author says about EQnext -"It was to be a resurrection of the golden days of slow burn gameplay, meaningful community, deep and expansive world making, and genuine long-term challenge."

EQNext was never going to be any of those things and only an idiot thought otherwise

Nice Ad Hominem there. You really ought to be constructive with your comments rather than just trash-talking.

[jolanar]

Originally Posted by Llurendt [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Nice Ad Hominem there. You really ought to be constructive with your comments rather than just trash-talking.

He is right though, EQ Next was never even advertised to be any of those things.