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Online Worlds Roundtable #12

A few days ago I participated in another IGN Online Worlds developer roundtable:

Topic: Are Online Worlds Too Complex?
Within the online world community, there are both developers and players who feel believe that, as a generalization, the games tend to be too complex, over-intellectualized and over-designed. For this segment in our Online Worlds Roundtable series, we invited representatives of various studios and project teams to offer their respective points of view on this interesting issue.

Claus Grovdal
Lead Designer and Producer, Darkfall
Aventurine

For the sake of this roundtable, I am going to assume that the complexity refers to MMOs being too hard to get into, and to keep playing because of high skill and knowledge requirements.

I don't think online worlds are too complex. Far from it. As a matter of fact, I find most current games too shallow and repetitive to hold player interest for very long. You don't need much skill to play most of them - mainly, you need time - and you too can own the Golden Platemail of Awesome. A good example of online worlds being oversimplified is the current trend of getting a quest from an NPC, and having the game literally draw a red line from point A to point B, so you can follow it and 'solve' the quest. That's not very challenging, and when it comes to demanding players, it can't hold much entertainment value either.

Players actually having to think doesn't make online worlds too complex. In my opinion a good game needs several layers of complexity that a player may or may not choose to get into. I like to think of it as a learning curve, with the prospect of more involving content down the line. As far as game design goes, I don't believe in simplifying the content, but rather the interaction with this content. You want players interfacing with the game as easily and smoothly as possible, but without sacrificing depth of gameplay.

I believe online worlds should be more complex than they are today. When players have killed every monster, solved every quest and tried out every emote, they'll need new levels of depth and new areas of gameplay to explore. Unfortunately, this is where most of the current online worlds have run their course.

Claus

Comments:

Exactly, MMO's needs a to be simple on the surface but far more complex once you get into it. Otherwise it just turns into time sink for item x, so you can time sink for item y *yawn*

# posted by  Zerikin Loukbel : 14/9/06 15:55

 

Very good article.
And this clause describes the most current MMORPGs.

"You don't need much skill to play most of them - mainly, you need time - and you too can own the Golden Platemail of Awesome"

That's why I'm waiting and hopping for Darkfall

# posted by  Feoir : 14/9/06 17:08

 

You are on the money. Most mmos lack depth and freedom. Darkfall is gonna take it to the next level.

# posted by  Earl : 14/9/06 21:56

 

A very good article. Thank you.

One question that interests me is why MMOs are comparatively simpler than single player games. Now it is a fact that simpler games attract more people (WoW is a testament to this). One reason, I believe is that MMOs attract players that arn't necessarily hardcore gamers, since there is a big social element. Another reason is that most people don't mind a challenge when they're alone and have all the time in the world to master the game. When they must do this in a competative environment, it not only becomes harder to be 'good at' the game, but people all of a sudden become very self conscious. Being killed non-stop by the AI is frustrating, but being 'owned' time and time again by a real person is embarrassing. The MMO genre must find ways of dealing with these issues.

# posted by  Sel'Karim : 15/9/06 04:45

 

I agree 100%. I'll use a simple RPG, Fallout, as an example. (Best RPG ever) You could simply go through all major quests and finish the game, but you also had an option to get into the game, explore it, learn it, discover new things, and truly enjoy it. I agree that current Online Worlds are indeed shallow. Most simply have tons of items, tons of skills, but no CONTENT. What I mean by content is true diversity of options. If a player has a really open field of options, such as going for PvP (Sieges, PKing, Raids, PvP driven Quests), Quests (Indepth, time taking and easy quests, side quests, rewards, lore exploration, "Easter Eggs"), or Crafting (Creating of items, potions, architecture, cities, etc), then game will be truly Indepth and enjoyable.

# posted by  Nefastus : 15/9/06 07:15

 

That's exactly it Claus, you walk around towns and cities, you see all these objects lieing around and interesting looking buildings, yet you can't touch them. Despite being in love with the Grand Theft Auto series, I have to admit that every single time I'm running through a city I think 'I wish I could hide in that bulding and the cops wouldn't know where I am', but sadly not.

That's another thing I hope you've avoided in Darkfall - 'Homing Guards'. Such an aweful idea, anyway I wont go further off topic.

Excellent article you conveyed a lot of the Darkfall community's feelings through it.

Hope the wife and child (children? thought you had a second) are well.

Dread.

# posted by  Dreadnaught : 27/9/06 23:22

 

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