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[Dick Delaware]

Deflagratio wrote...

Shamus  over at  the Escapist magazine has a lot of going points about MMOs and stuff. One of the biggest issue right now that we see with all MMO's is after a certain point, most of your gamer base is High-level endgame oriented. This means that Low-level content and zones are virtually wastelands that few, if any inhabit, and Endgame zones are overcrowded pits mired in damn-near civil war. It makes it incredibly hard to attract new customers to your game, because getting up to the Endgame is incredibly difficult, due to lack of people to quest/group with in your range. And by the time you get there, the endgame is so overpopulated with elitist pricks, you wind up feeling as if you wasted your time.

World of Warcraft is attempting to solve the issue at least partially with Cataclysm changing formerly lowbie zones into high-level, Final Fantasy XI attempted to counter the issues (Fairly successfully, but FFXI never had a huge client base so the results are isolated and biased) with a system that allowed higher-level characters to scale down themselves and their equipment immedietly to a target party member. But more often than not, this just shifts the problem. In World Of Warcrafts case, it's likely an equal number of zones will become useless territory while everyone focuses on the new content, and in FFXI, the Level-Syncing system lead to gross exploitating by finding and isolating specificly powerful camping locations, and spamming them into the dirt until the servers crash.  Both are valiant attempts, and I think if there was an effective solution, it would be a combination of both. This has to be an issue discussed at large by a team making a Mass Effect MMO. Luckily a new solution may be on the Horizon, though I won't know until I get hands-on with the Beta later this month. I'll save reflections on if it's a good deviation from class-Level characters until then.

The simple fact of the matter is Too many MMO's attempt to emulate World of Warcraft, and are blinded by the money that game is making, to see that WoW and all current MMO's are incredibly flawed and fairly stale (Only the social aspect keeps the game going so long, the mechanics dry out around the 3rd year, from then it becomes a question of how much redundancy you can tolerate). Mass Effect Hypothetical MMO CANNOT be an ME Skinned WoW Clone. It needs to provide a completely new experience, MMO makers need to evolve past the current state, a situation I feel Bioware will become PAINFULLY aware of when The Old Republic debuts. (Seriously, WoW in space and spoken dialog is all I've seen so far, even the same Cartoony, stupid blocky art style 7 years later, awesome).

I have many other thoughts on the subject of MMO's and what a Mass Effect (Or any really) Themed MMO has to do to really topple the giant World Of Warcraft finally, but I don't think you want to read a 92 page Interactive Arts thesis. so I'll sume it up.

If You're not Blizzard, Stop making World of Warcraft G O D  D A M M I T!!!

Great breakdown. I'm not familiar with MMO's, so this was very informative.

I do know however, that WoW has a 62% market share of the MMO audience, so clearly, they're going to have imitators. However, once people see failure after failure that's come out in the MMO market, aren't they going to try and do something different? Clearly, if there's no way to compete with WoW by being a different flavour of WoW, why not try something else?

I've heard Eve Online has been quite profitable. I know that obviously they have much less overhead than WoW, but how has Eve managed to attain some level of success in a genre littered with the corpses of dozens of failures?

[askanec]

Bioware is already frying the fish that is SW:TOR. After the investment Electronic Arts placed on Mythic's Warhammer Online, having it sell a initial promising 800,000+ copies, then having players deserting the game in droves a few short months later, I'd expect Bioware will fully concentrate on SW:TOR until it takes off.



EA has shown it does not play nice when online games do not live up to expectations. Example: the other EA published space-based MMO Earth and Beyond, which is now defunct.



Hence, I doubt a ME MMO would come anytime soon.

[netwitbrian]

I think if they keep the game play similar to ME2 with the combat, choices and such, it could be a good MMO. They already have the classes and the races and a whole galaxy to explore with people and places to boot. You could sign up with the Alliance or Cerberus and do missions for them. Or go renegade and join a merc group like the Blue Suns doing missions for them. The weapons and armor is already there too plus the biotic. Shoot most of the stuff for the MMO is there, just need to make the stories. Bioware could make this after ME3, they did say they wanted to expand the ME universe. This would be a good way to do it. Put it on the Xbox 360, I know there be alot of takers for a Xbox mmo.

[KalosCast]

It's bad enough that they're making an Old Republic MMO.



"oooh! Let's take a setting and a developer known for their decision based gaming and powerful storyline and adapt it to a gaming genre where your decisions and story don't effect the world for more than three minutes if they even leave the one congratulatory text box!"



Seriously, stop trying to beat WoW and stick with what works for you.

[biomag]

There is no MMO concept I would accept as I simply don't want to share my game with people online. I ain't impressed by this community either (as every online-community for what it matters) and MMO swallow the whole IP so that nothing else could be expected to be released. It kills good series for shallow games that get dragged farther down by masses of intellectually limited players.



So please, enjoy the ruined KOTOR and leave us ME. You can even kill Dragon Age that way, just leave us ME.

[KalosCast]

biomag wrote...

There is no MMO concept I would accept as I simply don't want to share my game with people online. I ain't impressed by this community either (as every online-community for what it matters) and MMO swallow the whole IP so that nothing else could be expected to be released. It kills good series for shallow games that get dragged farther down by masses of intellectually limited players.

So please, enjoy the ruined KOTOR and leave us ME. You can even kill Dragon Age that way, just leave us ME.

Well, Dragon Age seemed to go in the opposite direction by getting a tabletop RPG book for its setting (which I feel like the game was kind of setting up).

But yeah, the only real gameplay in MMOs is seeing if you can troll the widest chat audience possible, anything else is just spreadsheets with pretty gaphics.

[biomag]

KalosCast wrote...

biomag wrote...

There is no MMO concept I would accept as I simply don't want to share my game with people online. I ain't impressed by this community either (as every online-community for what it matters) and MMO swallow the whole IP so that nothing else could be expected to be released. It kills good series for shallow games that get dragged farther down by masses of intellectually limited players.

So please, enjoy the ruined KOTOR and leave us ME. You can even kill Dragon Age that way, just leave us ME.

Well, Dragon Age seemed to go in the opposite direction by getting a tabletop RPG book for its setting (which I feel like the game was kind of setting up).

But yeah, the only real gameplay in MMOs is seeing if you can troll the widest chat audience possible, anything else is just spreadsheets with pretty gaphics.

A pen & paper doesn't mean that they wouldn't try a MMO. TT-RPGs are a nice thing, but for me they don't substitute PC-RPGs simply because I often had timing problems with those willing to play. Now we all are working and no longer students, so we have even less time. Either way, TT-RPGs & MMOs don't share the same audience. Although most pen & paper players also play on the PC, still the MMO-consumers are a bigger market, as a lot of people playing on the PC ain't P&P roleplayers at all.

On the other hand I think DA-IP isn't going to turn into a MMO soon. At least DA 2 is going to be released before they start even planing that.

[KalosCast]

biomag wrote...

A pen & paper doesn't mean that they wouldn't try a MMO. TT-RPGs are a nice thing, but for me they don't substitute PC-RPGs simply because I often had timing problems with those willing to play. Now we all are working and no longer students, so we have even less time. Either way, TT-RPGs & MMOs don't share the same audience. Although most pen & paper players also play on the PC, still the MMO-consumers are a bigger market, as a lot of people playing on the PC ain't P&P roleplayers at all.

On the other hand I think DA-IP isn't going to turn into a MMO soon. At least DA 2 is going to be released before they start even planing that.

Well, I guess all I'm saying with that is that it I don't feel like Bioware is the type of studio to **** out their IP to everything possible, so we probably won't see more than one non-comic-book adaptation. I wasn't saying that PnP is "totally teh better" than MMOs either, just that they're pretty much polar opposite experiences (hence why I run a Fantasy Craft campaign on Tuesdays and play Champions Online when I get free time). But I definitely feel like something that is suited for one usually isn't suited for another, ignoring the numerous MMORPG adaptations of tabletop games including The Old Republic, Champions Online, and an in-production White-Wolf MMORPG since they'll probably all fail miserably (as much as I love CO, I don't see it lasting much more than a year).

[biomag]

I must admit I haven't seen the DA PnP-adaptation. Does it have a simple system like the PC version, or is it completely something different? If its strongly based upon the original than I could be turned easily into a MMO.



IMO PnP can easily be better if the players know what they are doing, especially as the main advantage (illustration) is so poorly done by MMOs.

[clust4fudge]

All I dare say is....OH MY GOD THE POTENTIAL THIS HAS!!!!!

[clust4fudge]

Also I might add that I believe that an ME MMO depends highly on the success of TOR. If it does well they are more than willing to tread new waters with an ME  MMO. However if it sux then why poop out another?

Modifié par clust4fudge, 31 mai 2010 - 12:53 .

[KalosCast]

clust4fudge wrote...

Also I might add that I believe that an ME MMO depends highly on the success of TOR. If it does well they are more than willing to tread new waters with an ME  MMO. However if it sux then why poop out another?

Hopefully ToR won't suck (though it probably will) because it would actually decrease their motivation to release another MMO, since they'd have to compete with themselves for subscriptions, which is exactly why you won't see Diablo Online or World of Starcraft either.

[Kalfear]

KalosCast wrote...

clust4fudge wrote...

Also I might add that I believe that an ME MMO depends highly on the success of TOR. If it does well they are more than willing to tread new waters with an ME  MMO. However if it sux then why poop out another?

Hopefully ToR won't suck (though it probably will) because it would actually decrease their motivation to release another MMO, since they'd have to compete with themselves for subscriptions, which is exactly why you won't see Diablo Online or World of Starcraft either.

So hard to tell what TOR going to be like

I mean they have the webs worst community right now with slap happy mods that clamp down on any sort of animated discussion making the web forums very bland and uninteresting to read. Lieing is ok but reacting to a lie gets you a warning or worse! How idiotic. TOR forums are a case in point example why ALL moderaters should be indepenant (not posters) people paid and trained to follow rules and regulation with out bias and agendas and little childish power trips and egos.

The Graphics look middle of the road at best, far far far less then one would hope for at this time and place in history.

They hired loser developers (UO, Galaxies, ect) whose games all failed to make game and just called it Bioware. Really its EA Austin.

You cant take their word for anything as it seems common place for Bioware to lie about products since the buy out, so take the fallowing upside points with a grain of salt.

On the upside

Sounds like you can solo from start to finish so thats appealing
No forced PVP
NOT SWG2 in any way, shape, or form, or capacity of any type (this better be true as SWG sucked huge)
200 hours of story per class (this I think is a bold face lie but im hoping im wrong) at release

So its a mixed bag right now. Based on Moderaters actions, developers hired, Graphics and interface, and over all honesty,, this game going to suck huge.

But there is some positives as well (long as they not bold face lies of course)

So one of those game you just have to wait and see. Its not bad cause its a MMO. DAOC was a awsome MMO game till ruined with stupid PVP orientated updates and expansions.

Time will tell. I hope its fun as I need something to waste time on but im so on the fence now about this game (Originally I was super pumped about it).

[KalosCast]

Just remember that the 200 hours of story includes all the time you "roleplayed" grinding your fishing skill.

Forced PVP is the only thing that makes an MMO anything other than a series of increasingly difficult attempts to get 20 bear asses.

Being able to solo the whole level cap means tons of time and money wasted on switching between your solo and teamwork builds via respec.

How are these positive points again?

Modifié par KalosCast, 31 mai 2010 - 07:30 .

[Rads GN006]

major problem with mmo's i have is a) the ability to nick years of your life and kil whatever social life you have left and second and most importantly the price! dear god i dont wanna pay X amount a month just to play online..... once i buy a game i should ahve bought it and earnt the right to play it, not be told i then have to sell my soul afterwards, i have a better idea however, multiplayer campaign available, in other words say goodbye to the annoying AI running round lie retards, you and 2 other brothers in arms playing either splitscreen or online beating the game, im sorry but if they did that in me2 i would have cried tears of joy, playing as legion/thane etc, how rad!

[Lumikki]

I don't remember have I been writen here allready, but here is my opinion.


NO THANKS.


I have played enough mmorpgs last 9 years and over 20 mmorpgs, so I can tell THEY all sucks. Problem isn't the game, it's the other players. Most important in Mass Effect single player games is the impression, what pulls you in the Mass Effect world and atmosphere. In mmorpgs this is not possible, because there is allways alot of players who have no clue how to keep up good game atmosphere. They just don't know how to behave and spoils the mmorpgs for everyone, except for them self.

How ever, they could make single player online game. But I don't see how it would be any different what we allready have. Only thing missing is online content updates and DLC are very close to it allready.

Modifié par Lumikki, 31 mai 2010 - 12:20 .

[Kalfear]

KalosCast wrote...

Just remember that the 200 hours of story includes all the time you "roleplayed" grinding your fishing skill.

Forced PVP is the only thing that makes an MMO anything other than a series of increasingly difficult attempts to get 20 bear asses.

Being able to solo the whole level cap means tons of time and money wasted on switching between your solo and teamwork builds via respec.

How are these positive points again?

Your the perfect example of what killed MMORPGs in modern day!

1) They have stated there will be none of those types of quests so get over that point already. Its not relevant till you can prove its in game.

2) PVP is a childish endevor to prove you goit the biggest Epeen and its freaking boring! Same crap over and over again, never changeing, same tactics, BORING! (and spare me about it being the only challenge in games. Thats been disproven completely many times over)

3) I have MY CHARACTER BUILD, I dont have special builds anymore as min maxing is the tool of useless players that need to try and get mathematical advantages in different situations. I just play my character now and still do better then most of you min/maxers in any given situation.

4) Quit worrying about having the biggest cyber epeen and just play the games, you might start enjoying them

5) I want to solo cause im sick and tired of playing with players like you that cant enjoy what the game is. You have to break it down to builds and code and cheats and think who has what weapon matters. Like poster above me, I just want to play a game, feel the stmoshpere, enjoy the experience. I beeen playing MMORPGs for more then 9 years (since begining actually) and im sick and tired of power gamers and elitists trying to force their styles on everyone else. I want a solo game so I can play when I want and how I want with out all the cyber drama.

Modifié par Kalfear, 31 mai 2010 - 05:20 .

[MasterGunner001]

Right now, Mass Effect is an RPG. You could add an option to connect online to a certain channel and see other players, maybe possibly trade and add them to your squad. Then, by DEFINITION, it is a MASSIVELY MULTIPLAYER ONLINE ROLEPLAYING GAME. Include it with Mass Effect 3, and it would add a HUGE amount to the awesome replay value it already has. And think about it from a MARKETING STANDPOINT BIOWARE!!! If I have a character that I spent 70 hours on, I want to keep playing the game without it getting boring or starting over, so I tell all of my friends to BUY THE GAME so we can play together. C'mon, it'd be the best thing EVER to have this in ME3.

[havoc373]

a mass effect mmo is probably the best natural evolution from a game series like Mass Effect. but i dont wanna see it anytime soon. and i dont expect to. Bioware and EA are not going to compete with one of their own MMO's (SWtoR) especialy when the audiences for both serries are very similar in alot of respects.

[Parthicus]

ME2 + Planetside + MAG

[Crespire]

[edit]
Reading back a few pages, it seems my idea is much more expansive than what the OP discussed. though I think the scope of what I propose would be much more rewarding to the fans.


[old post]
The Mass Effect universe would be a pretty interesting place to set a Planetside/EVE styled MMORPG. They've got a basic class system, and they have the makings of an item progression system (ME1).

The problem with MMOs is that a lot of developers try to integrate the MMO lore into the canon universe, and I don't really see very many places where an MMO would fit into the ME universe. I was thinking "Wouldn't it be cool if there was an MMO set during the First Contact War?" but then I realized that the council put an end to that war pretty quickly, so that might be better served as a single player game, starting the Illusive Man? Or perhaps from the perspective of an Alliance soldier (Anderson maybe?).

Any successful MMO has to have a singular focus. While PvP would be an interesting (and imo, rewarding) experience in the ME universe, Bioware's style suggests that it would be a very PvE focused game, with raid and endgame experiences pushing the story forward somehow. The problem with pushing the story forward, is that it has to end eventually (should Bioware/EA want to continue making single player games), and traditionally, people have always wanted MMO events and content to be canon. WoW is a great example of this. They've recycled content now Onyxia, and done a lot of other stuff that now has stupid lore justifications. Rather than say, "this is non-canon, and we're just releasing content" they incorporated it all, and I think that approach to an ME universe MMO would completely kill the strength of the franchise.

Then I thought, what other situations can we set an MMO in ME? The only war that is upcoming that we have no definite end to, as far as I'm aware, is the upcoming Quarian/Geth conflict. Especially with Admiral Xen, it has the possibility of involving more than just Quarian/Geth playable races, as she would presumably want to enslave humanity as well. (As indicated in her email to Shepard).

Over-all, I think the mechanics for a great ME MMO are already created, and they can leverage a lot of the systems design from ME1 and ME2 to create a rewarding experience, but again the traditional problem with MMOs is that canon gets slaughtered, which seems to be the main reason people simply object to the idea of an MMO. If the canon remains strong, and pve content makes sense in the context of the ME universe, it would be a pretty fun game.

Now, as I mentioned, I feel that the ME MMO would benefit strongly from being a rich PvE experience, but I think that a massively multiplayer combat experience set in the ME universe would be really exciting, to say nothing of ship to ship combat (ala EVE). I think Bioware could have a lot of success leveraging successful concepts from many MMOs to make ME MMO a rewarding experience.

In a perfect world, the ME MMO would take the best of MMO's from their respective genres and combine them well. STO I haven't played, but it's kind of the path I'm thinking. Have robust, space/ship based experiences (both pve and pvp), while also having a strong ground-side based experience (ala current ME titles, but adapted for the MMO scope). I think the perfect MMO would be ME universe space-combat with a strong ground-side combat side that is a rebalanced ME experience with an emphasis on player-vs-player mechanics. A lot of the game could work like EVE does, where most combat happens outside of Council space (ala EVE's 0.0 space). Planet-side, I think the ME MMO could leverage experience from other shooter-MMOs like Planetside, Tabula Rasa, and Huxley.

PvP could be done in places ala Pinnacle Station, as "training scenarios" or they could be instanced PvP scenarios like a colony raid, or similar. Of course, the instanced PvP scenarios that make a difference in the persistent world would be the prefered form of PvP (I think it would make sense). In fact, the ME MMO could feasibly take place in the Terminus systems, where anything that happened lore-wise would likely be easily incorporated into the canon regarding the ME universe. Much of what happens in Terminus space isn't of concern to the Council (save from starting a war by unifying the Terminus races), and there isn't a whole lot we know about ALL of the Terminus systems. This opens up a few brances of playable races, from Humans, Asari, Batarians, Turians, to other, more exotic races like Korgans, Vorcha, and possibly others.

Guild Wars was a very innovative MMO, and I think adapting a similar leveling curve as Guild Wars would make the ME MMO experience very enjoyable. Thinking about what makes WoW and other MMOs great is a good place to start, but if this were to happen, Bioware/EA would be creating a whole new experience that doesn't neccessarily fit into the "MMORPG" namespace. Obviously, this is hugely speculation and a bit of a wishlist. I am no programmer, and I doubt that such a concept would be easy to pull off, let alone pull off well.

tl;dr
* An ME Universe MMO would have to focus on story through rewarding endgame narrative. The ME universe is rich in story, and if it lost this focus, a large part of the audience would be alienated.
* PvP should be implimented as colony hit-and-run's by pirates vs defense forces (Systems Alliance, Turian Heirachy, etc). I think instanced colony raid/defense would be a good place to start pvp action. PvP initially being instanced, non-consequential can give Bioware an idea of how people play, and what they need to do to address balance issues. This could be expanded in the future to have persistent consequences (ala Planetside, where a planet shifts allegance)
* Setting could be in Terminus Space, thus avoiding the possibility of a large number of canon inconsistencies.
Keep in mind that such a game would vaguely be classified an "MMORPG" and thus, it would be wise to see what's worked and what hasn't from other games in similar spaces (Planetside, EVE, Tabula Rasa, etc)
* An ME MMO would not do well as a WoW/EQ/EVE rehash, so I don't think people should think of it as such. Rather, it would do well if it combined those experiences in a wholistic, fun, and accessible way.

Such a game would be immersive, and being so, it would have to be very accessible to casual players. Given the age we live in, I think a more "casual" approach to such a game would keep it alive and blooming much longer than if the game was dedicated to "hardcore" players. WoW is now trying to cater more to the casual crowd (believe me, I played it up until very recently as a hardcore player). Guild Wars is a good example of how to construct a casual game. The competitive scene in Guild Wars was pretty intense for a while, but died off due to game design decisions (skill balance, mostly).

This post is super long, Christ Almighty.

Modifié par Crespire, 07 août 2010 - 09:17 .

[superfatman]

If TOR is successful I would expect that BioWare would make a Mass Effect MMO. If TOR is fun then i would expect that BioWare would be able to make a Mass Effect MMO work, even if it would be a TOR with ME skin with more pew pew and less DA FORCE.

[Galenwolf]

Wait to see what the Warhammer 40k MMO does. From what I understand that isn't meant to be like a normal MMO. It looks to have combat like ME.

[C10Hamster]

You know, I've noticed something after coming across this board... The one subject most people seem to get stuck on is combat in an MMO. Has no one here ever played EVE Online? I don't do combat, I manufacture ships that aren't sold in my small corner of space. Heck, I have a small business going there. 2-4 hours everyday, it's a nice hobby. MMO's don't ruin lives, only those who are gamer addicts. And doesn't have to all be about combat.

Anyway, that's my line of thought right there.