Actually, for a while, in UO, I was a cook, and I made bread. My plan was to ba an evil assassin of sorts, selling poisoned bread to the NPC and PC wanderers alike, and then loot their bodies afterward. I expected it to be far more profitable than pickpocketing. However, poison in UO sucked. All it succeeded in doing was giving my victims tummyaches. Hell the NPC’s would even thank me afterward. In the end, I was spending more gold than I could make from poisoning people, so I ended up becoming a freakin warrior just like almost every other poor bastard that played UO.
There is nothing wrong with having alternative skills in the game, like fishing, cooking, carpentry, etc. as long as it IS worth something and not there JUST to create a more meaningful world for others to star in.
If poisoning worked like it should have, as well as the numerous other skills that had potential, then UO would probably still be at the top of the list. And I would probably still be playing it.
Downloaded the game, and although I haven’t spent much time with it, it looks interesting. Over the past couple of years, while I buy the occasional big title from major devs/publishers such as UT2003, I have been focussing on games from small developers such as Aaron Hall’s Space Empires 4, Combat Mission, and the like. There is so much gameplay to be found that it is a shame that many people associate niche games as being undesireable or take a look of the “non-state of the art” graphics and then move on.
I read the article at Slashdot Article on Everquest, and it is funny how most of the big guns focus on the “Power User”. I have resubscribed and unsubscribes numerous times and always have given up. There is just a certain point in the game that it doen’t make sense to play any more as once you reach a certain level, you need to start “power gaming”. My gaming time is spread accross all genres, and I certainly would not want to devote the majority of my gaming hours to one game. Being a casual gamer in Everquest, and soloing most of the time, you get to watch your experience bar move pixel by pixel and the whole process becomes excruciating. What these developers need to understand is the the casual gamer pays the same monthly fee as the “power gamer”. I suppose that the challenge is to cater to both groups. The casual gamer needs to feel that they are advancing and have interesting things to do, while the power gamers and their guildmates need challenges to meet their style. If the devs of EQ realized this, and didn’t design the game for “Pavlov’s Dogs” then I imagine I would have I would still been a customer.
I was wondering if Dransik offers oppportuniteies for both types of gamers. Another frustrating aspect of these types is games is the poor documentation. As a casual MMORPG gamer I don’t want to browse countless forums, fan sites, etc, to find out how best to spend my skill points. I know that these types of games are dynamic, but the documentation needs to be as well, all accessable from the developers site.
Thanks for the link, and I am looking forward to giving this one a whirl.
You guys just don’t get it. There are obviously a number of people out there (based on sales of economic games and games like Europa 1400) that are definitely willing to roleplay as an economic character.
It’s ironic, but the exact thing that is holding me back from getting into an online RPG is that I can’t play as anything but some brawny sword swinger or a foppish mage.
If any of these lame games had some real depth to them it would enable somebody to play as a completely non-violent character working in the economic system.
Look, obviously the lame ass fishing and smithing systems of most of these games are a joke, but that doesn’t mean that smithing and fishing aren’t worthwhile in a MMORPG, it just means they haven’t done it right yet.
I’m not sure how well Europa 1400 is selling, but I would definitely role-play an economic character. Getting people together to form a trading guild would be interesting… provided a game with an economy that’s worth a crap.
Ehmm, I dunno - Europa 1400 is all about ME. I play an economic character, and I get to rule my burg, own the whole town, win the game. That’s rather unlike what happens in a MMO.
I don’t think it’s selling very well either considering how little Jowood is pushing it.
No, no, I mean that ruling a town was winning the game. You beat it, etc. You don’t have to have specify objectives in Europa, but it’s still mainly a power grab. I was with… Tyjenks I think, saying “How about a hall of fame in Europa so we can measure ourselves?” which is not directly the same drive as someone deriving satisfaction from roleplaying a tradesperson in a game without win conditions.
I think plenty of people like to perform trade skills in MMORPGS. My point was that I didn’t think people who liked The Guild were necessarily those same people just because it’s tradesperson based.
[edit]I see your point though, that some people probably play the two in the same way[/edit]
Yes, Gazillionaire is still a game I play at least once a month. Economic games can be a blast. Check it out if you haven’t played it yet. There is a free shareware version at www.Lavamind.com
I definitely agree with your statement about making economic systems that really work.
I think players come with all sorts of different drives. I think a truly successful, mainstream, MMORPG would think about the psychological drives of different players and create roles/themes in the game that let them pursue what they wanted. I mean, for god’s sakes, The Sims is all about mundane folks decorating houses and having flings with each other. I don’t really think the Sims Online captures the ant farm aspect of this very well.
But imagine a MMORPG role as a farmer in which you had entertaining critters and handling them, as well as one’s land and crops, was how you made a profit. I’ve heard folks talking about a console game that worked like this. Maybe for the truly violent (IE typical) MMORPGer there could be barbarian tribes that existed soley by hunting, looting and raiding each other. Civilized realms could be a bit more structured and have stronger groups of NPCs that would act in defense and supporting roles. Farmers and other professions could have some militia-style combat skills to fight off barbarian incursions as well as deal with minor threats that cropped up. There could also be specialized noble castes that would have much stronger combat skills and some C&C abilities available only to them but also Casus Belli and Noblisse Oblige restrictions on behavior (unlike barbarian chieftains). Perhaps a strategic interface (like that new game Savage) as well they could use to give orders to PCs as well as NPCs.
To some extent I see SWG attempting a bit of this. I have to see how well the economy works and how entertaining the non-combat roles are to be sure before I leap into praises.
