A friend linked me this tonight. It’s Richard A. Bartle’s keynote from the Independent MMO GDC in which he discusses the problems facing MMOs today, and the changes need in the future. He also talks about EVE a good bit. If you’ve been following MMOs for years — and have several under your belt — a lot of this info is probably not new, but it is interesting.
Essentially, there are a few types of worlds. WoW-type worlds that are newbie friendly, guide you by the hand, and tend to be boring for the older players. EVE-type worlds that are not newbie friendly, yet have depth and freedom that older players like. Then Second Life-type worlds that are just different… Creating the world and such. He doesn’t go too deeply into the SL-type, I’m hoping I read that portion correctly (the Wendy world?) — he instead focuses on the previous two.
He makes the point of needing a WoW-type beginning, to introduce the newbie and get them in the world, but to then phase that world out into a more EVE-type one where older players will have their freedom and depth. A balanced world. I have to agree.
Games on rails are fun till you hit the end of the line. Being plopped down in the middle of a world and told to ‘enjoy’ can be overwhelming, but once you overcome the initial shock and begin to explore you can find a ton of potential entertainment. Fusing these two is the best option. However, there are some other points that need looking over.
Caps. Level caps are part of the end of the line and need to be done away with. EVE does this, in a way, by having every skill trainable by every character and not having a level cap or levels at all. You can reach a skill cap, eventually, but it will take years. Reaching the skill cap does not mean being the best, however, as player skill does play a large part. Having a game’s ‘skills’ be largely attributed to the player’s own skills is a good way to extend the life of the game. There is no real level cap or skill cap as the player tries to improve themselves.
The other point, with the player-generated content and open-ended gameplay of EVE, is PvP. A lot of that stuff in EVE is PvP oriented. How would this transfer over to a game that was going to be largely, or completely, PvE? Could it? The same friend of mine that linked the slides also went into this subject. Using competetive gameplay, that’s not the traditional ‘PvP’ — think of it like trading in EVE where you compete against other players, just not by shooting them in the face. So, you have two groups/nations/whatever competeing against each other. There’s no violent PvP, instead influence and other ‘resources’ gained through doing various PvE tasks. I’d guess it’d be like Warhammer Online without the RvR content — and more PvE content. It could be fun I think.
In anycase, it’s a good read and has many good points. We need some balance to our MMO worlds.
