Suggestion: Generate additional revenue

[Akrion]

They definitely did intend - in that particular puzzle - for you to stack up three boxes that were inside a building to get to the first accessible step of a broken stairwell, and retrieve the purple key-card. Otherwise, there wouldn't have been voiceover content/etc up there....

And if they intended our solution, I think they might have installed "friction" into their physics engine Arm Sim 1998 was ambitious - far too ambitious for its rushed-to-release-date.

My partner suggests fancier visual armour/clothes for further fluff options - and maybe a more distinctive "Istaria" design for biped gear.

I'll bet you there are voiceover locations that you've missed in Trespasser, for example there's one when you approach a crashed jeep in a far off corner of a map that is in the opposite direction you're supposed to go, there is nothing of significance at this jeep and this is far from the only instance. There's another voice over in the test area that you can get to by running along a wall in the map with the town you need to get key cards for. Just because there's a voice over at that spot doesn't mean you were absolutely intended to go there.

There's even a place you can get to in the demo which was designed to be another level in the game but was never complete. Trespasser isn't a great game to point fingers at for examples. xD There's no way to truly tell if something was intended by the devs to be linear, open choice, or just a bug.

[fermi443]

...You've forgotten Adventuring in there somewhere. And by "Craft(repair generic static structures)," are you trying to say that that's all you do with crafting in this game?...

Yes, and no.

No: At the moment, with a dead player market, and no game economics that actually function to full effect, the usefulness of playing a crafting/economic character is almost impossible to work with. Given more users, and time, this could be applicable.

Yes: Dragons, have almost zero use for crafting besides, structure building, and making their end game gear, besides the stat boosts, there really isn't any avenue there, it's just a secondary task. (Not to mention forcing it on the player as a requirement for RoP and ARoP undertaking.)

Adventuring = Quests, or raising your skill from killing things, it's not so different, so I wouldn't count it as it's own avenue for playing.

EvE online is an excellent example, if you're looking for an MMO, which allows you to really mix up the way you play. What most MMOs would consider, cheating, EvE Online considers a legitimate strategy.



If you so chose, you could almost literally play "The Bad Guy" for players, simply by lieing, cheating, and scamming them of game currency. One such technique, is setting up false contracts with players, and having a team of friends camp the nearest exit to the area, then spring once a player attempts the contract. If the unlucky stranger isn't paying attention, it's likely to be a success.

EvE is a universal sandbox, because anywhere you go, you can generate standings with those regions of the game world. Everyone can view you differently, down to the individual user level, and your notoriety will have you judged accordingly. By doing tasks/quests/contracts, whatever you wish to call them, you actually build trust with the character involved. The character is then more likely to send you on more confidential missions, of greater risk, because they believe you worthy, you then have a choice to make, to complete the task, say, hauling a very expensive ship to another location, or you could steal it for yourself. All out of context, and out of script.

In EvE it's possible to play a character, who is entirely a peaceful explorer. Profiting from studying archaeology, and researching ancient relics lost in space from civilizations long lost.

One more feature I like from EvE, is directed skill improvement. Where in many MMOs your character is limited by race/class, EvE gives you a blank slate, and lets you draw out exactly what your character is able to do, infinitely. This means it's more than possible to learn every skill in the game. The only problem is if you happen to die, your clone can only remember so much of your knowledge. After this, one learns to choose wisely what they want, and build a strong character for themselves.

Now should Istaria have these features? Definitely not exactly! To a degree these examples I have given, lay some of the foundations for what exactly makes a sophisticated and fun experience in an MMO. What I am saying is that we can learn from this, and build less script into the world, and more freedom of action, choice, and playstyle. Finding new ways to let the game reach out and interact the player as much as the player interacts with it. I could ramble on and on about each and every little thing to improve and end up with a post longer than I am tall. This just being said, I hope this is some nice food for thought for you guys. Looking forward to more brainstorming.

[Akrion]

It's difficult to really compare Eve to any other MMO. No other MMO comes anywhere close to the concentrated server population that Eve Online has, and it's this average presence of roughly 50,000 players at any given time that likely allows Eve Online to pull off much of what it does.

Eve Online has one of the harshest death penalties in any MMO. This alone gives it a massive money sink, mix that with the heavily player controlled market and CCP can afford to let people sell GTCs for in game cash without it obliterating the economy.

So most every design decision for a game like Eve Online can't really be applied to Istaria in any way simply because of the huge community population difference as well as the server population difference. Istaria still has a huge problem with limited money sinks for example.

[fermi443]

@Akrion
I couldn't agree more. EvE stands out because of that. It's an entirely unique flavor of game. One with a bitter aftertaste often for those who have no idea what to do, or how to actually play the game efficiently. It's not even the player's fault 99.9% of the time. The tutorial and built in explanations for the user to learn how to play, aren't informative or immersive enough to actually bring the lessons to practice, and perfection. Not to mention, new players HATE walls of text. It's a proven fact we've come to deal with. Casual gamers looking to delve further into the game and become core gamers eventually become locked out. This is mostly because they lack the attention to the details that core gamers have become trained to look for from the beginning. Casual gamers want to be talked into a game, convinced the experiences will be worth their while, and there will be reward for their actions, and effect in the game world.

Yeah, the death penalty is harsh for some. Too many spent points in the wrong skills you don't necessarily need, will leave you trying desperately to generate currency to afford a clone capable of remembering all of your knowledge. I also totally agree as stated, Istaria isn't anywhere near the flavor of EvE, and it's not meant to be. Istaria wouldn't work with those same major workings. Underneath it however in the underlying bare foundation of gameplay, there are hidden principles which if built into the right ideas could be made into great additions for a game like Istaria, given time and effort.

One of my bigger points I'd like to emphasize more is a greater more in touch reward for the player completing actions, or discovering new areas. Theres something about exploring the unknown, with a blacked out mini map, and the names of new areas flashing up on screen with rewarded numbers of points or XP. Even something as small and insignificant sounding as sound effects for getting and completing new quests, does a lot more to build excitement in your player than most realize. That little jingle after your battles in Final Fantasy, always satisfies, especially after you unlock a new power. As the characters in your party look on, astonished, you get this inner fulfilling sense of pride, and it drives you to play on and experience more. Spell or ability effects physically looking more powerful as you obtain more improved versions, intensifies the satisfaction of striving for that upgrade. What is good about most of these kind of changes, they're not developmentally intensive for the most part, and can be implemented in small chunks, like what is being done now in the usual updates. These sort of improvements at least keep a more focused design decision for the current amount of players and the target audience of new players we want to introduce to the game.

Put more simply; I agree, lets polish the easier, effective, and important stuff first.