If you have been reading this blog since the beginning (i.e. last week), you know my ultimate goal is to develop my very own computer game. As I started to think more about what it is going to take to actually create it, I realized one thing is for certain, I need a plan. What you will read below is a simple overview of the direction I am going to head. Nothing is set in stone and I most certainly welcome feedback.
Phase 1
-Write. Write as much as I can and post it on this blog. Get all of my gaming stories, loves, hates, ideas and ignorance and slap it into some posts.
-Gain some readers. Not sure how I am going to go about doing this. My initial thought would be to contact some of the bloggers I read on a regular basis and exchange links. (Thanks Werit!)
Phase 2
-Start acquiring feedback from readers about certain aspects of the game, such as setting and gameplay features.
-Unveil the core design aspects of the game.
-Begin building website for the game.
Phase 3
-Assemble a super friends type team to actually get the game off the ground.
-Tweak game design and begin programming.
-Try our hand at kickstarter.com to see if we can actually get some backing.
As you can see, there are no dates or timetables as of yet. I want to be as open and as flexible as I can when it comes down to the process.
Friday, March 9, 2012
Wednesday, March 7, 2012
What should I buy?
In yesterday's SWTOR patch, end game crystals are now available for purchase, but only until 1.2 is released. I purchased a +41 endurance purple crystal for my Jedi Guardian, but I am not sure what else to get.
I am not swimming in credits, but I should have enough to buy 1 or 2 other items from this new vendor. Here are my options:
1. Another end game +41 stat purple crystal (Bind on Equip).
2. Schematic for a +33 magenta crystal (Bind on Pickup, previously only available from downing world bosses).
Both are 250k. I am leaning toward the purple crystal only because they are BoE and they are only available through end game dungeons (I think), which I most likely won't be running anytime soon (if ever). If I end up farming 500k before 1.2 comes out, should I get one of each, or two purple crystals? If I can raise 1 million credits, I can buy a white crystal, then again, who needs a job or a wife that will talk to me.
Thoughts?
1. Another end game +41 stat purple crystal (Bind on Equip).
2. Schematic for a +33 magenta crystal (Bind on Pickup, previously only available from downing world bosses).
Both are 250k. I am leaning toward the purple crystal only because they are BoE and they are only available through end game dungeons (I think), which I most likely won't be running anytime soon (if ever). If I end up farming 500k before 1.2 comes out, should I get one of each, or two purple crystals? If I can raise 1 million credits, I can buy a white crystal, then again, who needs a job or a wife that will talk to me.
Thoughts?
Tuesday, March 6, 2012
What SWTOR Did Wrong
I have been playing SWTOR since early access and I must say I have been enjoying my experience thus far. The single player story lines are engrossing and I have been taking my sweet time to get to 50 (I hit level 45 last night). I am a PvP'er at heart, so a lot of my leveling has come from warzones. Coming from WAR and EVE, I, like may out there, find that the PvP in SWTOR is missing something. Okay, it's missing more than a thing, it's missing several things, but I think one of those things will do more to hurt the future of PvP in the game than any other:
No Faction Pride
This may not seem like it's a big deal to some, but for me, this is a deal breaker. As I was looking through old screenshots of my days in WAR for a previous post, I actually recognized many character names, not just from Destro, but from Order as well. I loved being in the RvR lake and hearing someone scream, "There's Dissb, focus Dissb!" There was something exciting about seeing a guild tag and being able to attach a reputation to it. Believe it or not, I actually liked being recognized, and subsequently focused, while fighting. All it did was elevate my level of hatred for the opposing faction and make me want to fight that much harder next time around. In the grand scheme of things, it also helped develop a sense of realm pride. Forums posts were filled with emotion and smack talk. Order hated Destro and Destro hated Order, it was as simple as that.
In SWTOR, anyone can make a character on any faction on any server, which completely forfeits any chance of fostering a PvP community. Even if they added meaningful open world objectives, like capturable bases, many players would simply log into whatever faction was winning at the time. Sure, there would be players and guilds who would stick to their side no matter what, but they are few and far between. Even in WAR, there were stories of Mitt Romney-esque flip floppers who would keep two subscriptions going just so they could play for whichever realm was dominant at the time. What incentive does a player have to stick with his/her faction when they are outnumbered and getting rolled by superior numbers? I hate to say it, but many players would just logout then login with their character that's on the winning side in order to take advantage of the easy valor gains.
I could be wrong about all of this. They could introduce a revamped Illum in the future that does a much better job luring players to the planet. They could come up with take-and-hold objectives that give faction-wde buffs which would be enticing enough for players to clobbers each other over. But in the end, what's the point? Do I actually feel like I have have accomplished something when I logout? Sure, my character hits level 60 valor and the fights are fun, but all I am doing is running on that incentive based hamster wheel that only keeps me playing to gain a higher level so I can wear better gear, which helps me gain a higher level so I can wear better gear, which helps me....oh, wait.
No Faction Pride
This may not seem like it's a big deal to some, but for me, this is a deal breaker. As I was looking through old screenshots of my days in WAR for a previous post, I actually recognized many character names, not just from Destro, but from Order as well. I loved being in the RvR lake and hearing someone scream, "There's Dissb, focus Dissb!" There was something exciting about seeing a guild tag and being able to attach a reputation to it. Believe it or not, I actually liked being recognized, and subsequently focused, while fighting. All it did was elevate my level of hatred for the opposing faction and make me want to fight that much harder next time around. In the grand scheme of things, it also helped develop a sense of realm pride. Forums posts were filled with emotion and smack talk. Order hated Destro and Destro hated Order, it was as simple as that.
In SWTOR, anyone can make a character on any faction on any server, which completely forfeits any chance of fostering a PvP community. Even if they added meaningful open world objectives, like capturable bases, many players would simply log into whatever faction was winning at the time. Sure, there would be players and guilds who would stick to their side no matter what, but they are few and far between. Even in WAR, there were stories of Mitt Romney-esque flip floppers who would keep two subscriptions going just so they could play for whichever realm was dominant at the time. What incentive does a player have to stick with his/her faction when they are outnumbered and getting rolled by superior numbers? I hate to say it, but many players would just logout then login with their character that's on the winning side in order to take advantage of the easy valor gains.
I could be wrong about all of this. They could introduce a revamped Illum in the future that does a much better job luring players to the planet. They could come up with take-and-hold objectives that give faction-wde buffs which would be enticing enough for players to clobbers each other over. But in the end, what's the point? Do I actually feel like I have have accomplished something when I logout? Sure, my character hits level 60 valor and the fights are fun, but all I am doing is running on that incentive based hamster wheel that only keeps me playing to gain a higher level so I can wear better gear, which helps me gain a higher level so I can wear better gear, which helps me....oh, wait.
Monday, March 5, 2012
Must. Have.
Coming to a Taco Bell near you on March 8. Huffington Post reported that 85 million Dortito taco shells were prepared for Thursday's unveiling. Below is a simple math equation detailing how I will be spending my spring break afternoons:Doritos Locos Taco + March Madness Basketball + Adult Beverages = Happy Chow.
The King is dead! Long live the King!
In February 2010, I was privileged enough to take part in an event that would go down as one of the greatest achievements in an MMO of my entire gaming career.
First, a little background. It was the summer of 2009 and I was firmly entrenched playing Warhammer Online. Being a teacher, I had the summers off so I had ample time to sink into the game. My goblin shaman had hit level 40 sometime in March and I was steadily moving up the renown ranks. The guild I was with was small, but tight knit. Two or three days a week we put together a group of 6 to RvR or run Blood/Bile to gear up our guild mates. With the introduction of keep timers that spring, each realm had the opportunity to raid each others' cities a handful of times. But alas, the king was never killed.
For those of you that don't remember, the only way to obtain sovereign gear back then was to kill the king. After you lock a zone, you had to assault the fort. If you succeeded, you moved onto another zone. Once you locked down that zone, you had to assault that fort and if you succeeded, the opposing city would be open to invasion. Once inside the city, your realm had to do its best to win a zone-wide public quest several times against the opposing realm, all while spread across multiple instances. If you lost 1 PQ in 1 instance early on, it could spell disaster for your side. If your realm did manage to sweep the city instances, then you would be granted access to the end game PvE content that included 3 mini-bosses and finally the opposing realm's king. As you can see, this was no small undertaking and required the coordination of your side's tier 4 forces to succeed.
On the evening of February 20, a king push was called by our alliance. The plan was to push each zone back to just before locking it over the course of the night. (they had gotten rid of the fortresses by this point, which in hindsight, was not a good sign). At about 3:30am, our forces were then to begin locking the first zone down. Yes, you read that correctly, 3 FREAKIN' 30am. I remember helping out until about 2am, then "resting my eyes" until about 3 or so, getting into the main warband just in the nick of time. Eataine locked without a hitch, as most sane gamers were sound asleep. As our now 3 warband strong army began storming Reikwald, the word went out to get your friends online to help lock with the push. By the time Reikwald locked around 5am, we had almost 5 warbands,(over 100 players) online and salivating at the chance to push the city.
To make a long story even longer, we ended up sweeping through the city PQ's in dominant fashion, Order not able to muster a force to deal with our 2 A-Team groups (you couldn't enter the 2nd instance until the first was filled, and so on). We had been to the king once before and failed, so this time we wanted retribution. After a long, hard fought battle, our warband ultimately downed Karl Franz at 8:52am eastern time, much to the jubilation of our Destro allies. Never had the king been taken down by either side on the Badlands server, or on my previous 2 servers (Ostermark and Phoenix Throne). It was one of the greatest feelings I had ever had as a gamer up to that point.
I have yet to experience anything even close to this in any game I have played since. We didn't just down a boss in a dungeon, we didn't beat a rival premade in a scenario. We attacked and defeated an entire realm of opposing players. It meant something. King kills on most servers didn't happen every day, or even every week or month. From the time I quit playing WAR, only THREE king kills had been achieved on our server. Why only 3? Because WAR is a game based on PvP, so you had to overcome the unpredictability of human action in order to succeed. Every keep attack, every skirmish, every one vs. one was different. Heroes were created and rivalries were cemented over the course of many epic battles in the RvR lakes, which in my opinion is what kept many players logging in, even in the those days of low populations and disappearing servers.
First, a little background. It was the summer of 2009 and I was firmly entrenched playing Warhammer Online. Being a teacher, I had the summers off so I had ample time to sink into the game. My goblin shaman had hit level 40 sometime in March and I was steadily moving up the renown ranks. The guild I was with was small, but tight knit. Two or three days a week we put together a group of 6 to RvR or run Blood/Bile to gear up our guild mates. With the introduction of keep timers that spring, each realm had the opportunity to raid each others' cities a handful of times. But alas, the king was never killed.
For those of you that don't remember, the only way to obtain sovereign gear back then was to kill the king. After you lock a zone, you had to assault the fort. If you succeeded, you moved onto another zone. Once you locked down that zone, you had to assault that fort and if you succeeded, the opposing city would be open to invasion. Once inside the city, your realm had to do its best to win a zone-wide public quest several times against the opposing realm, all while spread across multiple instances. If you lost 1 PQ in 1 instance early on, it could spell disaster for your side. If your realm did manage to sweep the city instances, then you would be granted access to the end game PvE content that included 3 mini-bosses and finally the opposing realm's king. As you can see, this was no small undertaking and required the coordination of your side's tier 4 forces to succeed.
 |
| Taking down King Karl Franz...no, he did not pump <clap> us up. |
To make a long story even longer, we ended up sweeping through the city PQ's in dominant fashion, Order not able to muster a force to deal with our 2 A-Team groups (you couldn't enter the 2nd instance until the first was filled, and so on). We had been to the king once before and failed, so this time we wanted retribution. After a long, hard fought battle, our warband ultimately downed Karl Franz at 8:52am eastern time, much to the jubilation of our Destro allies. Never had the king been taken down by either side on the Badlands server, or on my previous 2 servers (Ostermark and Phoenix Throne). It was one of the greatest feelings I had ever had as a gamer up to that point.
I have yet to experience anything even close to this in any game I have played since. We didn't just down a boss in a dungeon, we didn't beat a rival premade in a scenario. We attacked and defeated an entire realm of opposing players. It meant something. King kills on most servers didn't happen every day, or even every week or month. From the time I quit playing WAR, only THREE king kills had been achieved on our server. Why only 3? Because WAR is a game based on PvP, so you had to overcome the unpredictability of human action in order to succeed. Every keep attack, every skirmish, every one vs. one was different. Heroes were created and rivalries were cemented over the course of many epic battles in the RvR lakes, which in my opinion is what kept many players logging in, even in the those days of low populations and disappearing servers.
Friday, March 2, 2012
Persistance
(This is the first of a series of posts that will outline my own game design
philosophy. These will be a work in progress and I may go back and edit
them in the future)
How does that quote from that guy from that movie go? "If you let them build it, they will come...and then stay." Yes, I know I am slightly misquoting, but the quote I quoted fits better than the quote I didn't quote. Got that?
Gamers should feel connected to the content. At the end of the day, there has to some sort of tangible gain. MMOs and RPGs use many forms of this to keep players coming back. There are levels to gain, currency to acquire, and gear to obtain. After a long session of gaming, most players can see how their character has changed, whether it be visibly with a new piece of armor, or intrinsically by learning new, more powerful abilities. There is a sense of accomplishment, a sense of gain. More importantly, those gains are there to stay.
EVE Online, one of the greatest sandbox MMOs ever created, is by definition a persistent world. What you do on in game one day could not only effect you, but the hundreds of other players across the server. Systems are conquered and reconquered, reputations are built and destroyed, and billions of ISK are earned or lost every single day in EVE. There are no server transfers, no rollbacks, no respawning with all of your gear in a friendly station after having been ganked while mining. Your actions, your triumphs, your failures are all permanent fixtures in the game. As a result, you write your own history as you progress through the game. There is no NPC telling you have earned the rank of Supreme Galactic Overlord, it is the playerbase itself that bestows (or strips away) the titles to other players.
The game I am looking to design will most certainly include an experience that persists for the gamer from the time they create their character to infinity and beyond. A sense of growth is what will keep players playing. I feel it is important that players feel as though they are invested in the content they are creating. The player should be able to connect to the units that they create and the battles that they fight. Every time they log in, their deeds and actions should be accessible to them, whether it be their winning percentage, that new unit they had just unlocked due to a victory the day before, or simply a skill that has finished that took a week to train. This will be their army, and although there may be many like it, this one will be theirs.
How does that quote from that guy from that movie go? "If you let them build it, they will come...and then stay." Yes, I know I am slightly misquoting, but the quote I quoted fits better than the quote I didn't quote. Got that?
Gamers should feel connected to the content. At the end of the day, there has to some sort of tangible gain. MMOs and RPGs use many forms of this to keep players coming back. There are levels to gain, currency to acquire, and gear to obtain. After a long session of gaming, most players can see how their character has changed, whether it be visibly with a new piece of armor, or intrinsically by learning new, more powerful abilities. There is a sense of accomplishment, a sense of gain. More importantly, those gains are there to stay.
EVE Online, one of the greatest sandbox MMOs ever created, is by definition a persistent world. What you do on in game one day could not only effect you, but the hundreds of other players across the server. Systems are conquered and reconquered, reputations are built and destroyed, and billions of ISK are earned or lost every single day in EVE. There are no server transfers, no rollbacks, no respawning with all of your gear in a friendly station after having been ganked while mining. Your actions, your triumphs, your failures are all permanent fixtures in the game. As a result, you write your own history as you progress through the game. There is no NPC telling you have earned the rank of Supreme Galactic Overlord, it is the playerbase itself that bestows (or strips away) the titles to other players.
The game I am looking to design will most certainly include an experience that persists for the gamer from the time they create their character to infinity and beyond. A sense of growth is what will keep players playing. I feel it is important that players feel as though they are invested in the content they are creating. The player should be able to connect to the units that they create and the battles that they fight. Every time they log in, their deeds and actions should be accessible to them, whether it be their winning percentage, that new unit they had just unlocked due to a victory the day before, or simply a skill that has finished that took a week to train. This will be their army, and although there may be many like it, this one will be theirs.
Thursday, March 1, 2012
My Gaming History
1987 -My earliest memory of video gaming is of my older brother threatening to clobber me if I didn't get Legend of Zelda for NES for my 6th birthday. I then was allowed to watch him play through the entire game before I even got a chance to make my own character.
1991-1994 -Super NES changes the way I game, introducing me to the 4 button concepts. Sim City, NBA Jam, and Super Baseball Simulator 1000 rules my life.
1995 -My computer gaming life truly begins. Command and Conquer, Civilization 2 and Master of Orion 2* dominate much of my play time. X-Wing, Tie Fighter, and you guessed it, X-Wing vs. Tie Fighter throw me s-foils first into the SciFi genre.
*Side note: Game sequels have a much better chance to being better than the original than movie sequels do, am I right? And if you say D2 was better than Mighty Ducks I just may have to punch you in the face.
1998-1999 -Starcraft 2 introduces me to online multiplayer gaming. I dominate myworldwide, national, county, high school homeroom ladder. Alpha Centauri sears itself into my brain as being one of the greatest turn based strategy games I will ever play.
2000-2005 -College and my entry into the so called "real" "world" causes me to focus more on being an actual contributor to society rather than play games. It was a dark time.
2006-2007 -My foray into massive multiplayer online gaming begins as I download the trial for Eve Online. Oddly enough, the reason I didn't get into the game earlier was that I thought you needed to own a joystick to play, which I did not own at the time and was too lazy and go buy. During this time I also purchase Lord of the Rings Online when it is released. I still remember being blown away that when you equipped new armor, the appearance of your character changed as well. I mean, who are the ad wizards that came up with that one?
2008-2010 -I take a much needed break from EVE and join my brother who was currently playing Warhammer Online. Being a WAR junkie from the time I was a kid, the game immediately consumes all my available play time. The guild I join goes from 15-20 active members online at once to 5-10 (which certainly mirrored WAR's declining player base at the time). I stick with the game for about 15 months, which is my longest stint in an MMO to date. During this time, I had the chance to be a realm captain of sort, organizing city raids and taking part in our server's first ever king kill (more on that in a later post).
2010-2011 -With the release of Tyrannis, EVE sucks me right back in and I begin making oodles of ISK making control towers. The click-fest that was planetary interaction slowly gets to me, and I experiment with other games like Fallen Earth and Perpetuum. I also purchase Starcraft 2 and once again begin to dominate all those oppose me...in the bronze ladder. During this time I also play through Fallout 3, which in a nutshell, was rad.
Present Day -I am currently playing Star Wars: The Old Republic. In middle school, I was reading an average of 2 Star Wars novels a month and promised myself to name my first born Wedge. That, coupled with married life and this "job" my wife keeps making me go to, it is the perfect fit for me right now.
1991-1994 -Super NES changes the way I game, introducing me to the 4 button concepts. Sim City, NBA Jam, and Super Baseball Simulator 1000 rules my life.
1995 -My computer gaming life truly begins. Command and Conquer, Civilization 2 and Master of Orion 2* dominate much of my play time. X-Wing, Tie Fighter, and you guessed it, X-Wing vs. Tie Fighter throw me s-foils first into the SciFi genre.
*Side note: Game sequels have a much better chance to being better than the original than movie sequels do, am I right? And if you say D2 was better than Mighty Ducks I just may have to punch you in the face.
1998-1999 -Starcraft 2 introduces me to online multiplayer gaming. I dominate my
2000-2005 -College and my entry into the so called "real" "world" causes me to focus more on being an actual contributor to society rather than play games. It was a dark time.
2006-2007 -My foray into massive multiplayer online gaming begins as I download the trial for Eve Online. Oddly enough, the reason I didn't get into the game earlier was that I thought you needed to own a joystick to play, which I did not own at the time and was too lazy and go buy. During this time I also purchase Lord of the Rings Online when it is released. I still remember being blown away that when you equipped new armor, the appearance of your character changed as well. I mean, who are the ad wizards that came up with that one?
2008-2010 -I take a much needed break from EVE and join my brother who was currently playing Warhammer Online. Being a WAR junkie from the time I was a kid, the game immediately consumes all my available play time. The guild I join goes from 15-20 active members online at once to 5-10 (which certainly mirrored WAR's declining player base at the time). I stick with the game for about 15 months, which is my longest stint in an MMO to date. During this time, I had the chance to be a realm captain of sort, organizing city raids and taking part in our server's first ever king kill (more on that in a later post).
2010-2011 -With the release of Tyrannis, EVE sucks me right back in and I begin making oodles of ISK making control towers. The click-fest that was planetary interaction slowly gets to me, and I experiment with other games like Fallen Earth and Perpetuum. I also purchase Starcraft 2 and once again begin to dominate all those oppose me...in the bronze ladder. During this time I also play through Fallout 3, which in a nutshell, was rad.
Present Day -I am currently playing Star Wars: The Old Republic. In middle school, I was reading an average of 2 Star Wars novels a month and promised myself to name my first born Wedge. That, coupled with married life and this "job" my wife keeps making me go to, it is the perfect fit for me right now.
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