[MUD-Dev] \"An essay on d00dism and the MMORPG\"

[John Buehler]

Paul Schwanz writes:

> > From: "John Buehler" <johnbue at msn.com>
>
> > You also made mention of recognition at the beginning.  I'm not
> quite sure
> > why.  That's why the little floating name thing remains in the
> game, even
> > with an introduction system.  Your CHARACTER recognizes another
> character
> > and the little name pops up.  If your character doesn't
> recognize the other,
> > then no name appears, even if the PLAYER recognizes the character.  Or
> > thinks so.
> >
>
> I have a couple of questions about this.  In real life, there are
> all kinds of
> clues that help us recognize who is talking, but I can think of some
> difficulties for virtual environments.  If there are no names,
> aren't we then
> pretty much forced to show speech appearing above someone's head
> so that we can
> tell who is talking?  (I'm talking specifically about cases where
> your character
> DOESN'T yet recognize other characters around him.)  And if we use the
> speech-over-the-head method, what does this mean for a first
> person perspective
> virtual environment?  If speech is appearing above the head of
> someone who is
> behind you, do you not hear it?  Or maybe "someone behind you says, 'Hi'"
> appears in a text box, while speech in your field of vision
> appears over head?
> But this still leaves out many of the sound directional cues that
> would tell us
> whether a person speaking was near or far, to the left or to the
> right, etc.  If
> there are a number of people behind us, how do we know which one
> spoke?  Maybe
> the words would linger a bit so that when we turned around we
> could still see
> them hanging in the air above the speaker's head?  This is the
> best solution I
> can come up with, but has anyone else thought about this or
> considered it's
> implications?  Any other ideas for solutions?

I'm sure this is a pet project of a number of game designers.  My personal
take is something that I'd very much like to sit down and try to prototype.
It begins with the realization that the display and the speakers of the
system are all about presenting the perceptions of the character.  The
character is the player's view into the world.  So presenting a realistic
view of the world is NOT the goal of the display and speakers.  The goal is
to present the information that the player needs to understand the world
environment as the character perceives it.

Present the objects that the character can see clearly, and the objects that
the character cannot see with less detail.  Drop color where color cannot be
seen, and drop to lower levels of detail where that is applicable.  I'd
never attempt to do all this in a first-person display.  For more than just
the reason of it being difficult to present intelligently.

Is your character blinded?  Okay, no visual cues at all.  Just sounds,
smells and contact.  The longer your character is blinded, the more capable
those senses become.  Does this mean that the screen goes black?  Absolutely
not.  The other senses are firing on all cylinders, and that information has
to be presented.  Because we only have the screen and the speakers to
present information, they should both be used to maximum effect.

Got somebody sneaking up behind your character?  You only have a greyness
behind your character.  Nothing there.  That sneaky type steps on a twig and
snaps it, and that causes some indication to appear on the screen at the
approximate location of the sound, accompanied by the sound itself.  You can
now react, causing your character to whirl to defend itself or to just run.
Or whatever else you're after.

Smell a troll?  Put a visual indication on the screen suggesting that a
noticeable smell has just popped up.  The visual indication should be in a
direction relative to the character - upwind, usually.

Walking through the market amidst all the hubbub?  Your character's senses
start to get overwhelmed, and you don't get to sense everything that's
there.  Only the strongest smells, loudest sounds and most obvious visual
activity will be presented clearly.  All other information will be limited
or absent.  So while you're smelling that wonderful bread, watching the
juggler and hearing the music, a thief just cut your pursestrings.  You
never noticed because your character's senses were overloaded.  Your
character didn't notice it, so you weren't told about it.

Walking through the market looking for a serated dagger?  Tell your
character to do that very thing.  When your character spots a serated
dagger, you will be informed of the fact.  Ideally, in some obvious visual
way.  An arrow pointing at the dagger on the table, or whatever.  Note that
all the other contents of the table don't even have to be shown initially.
Not in any detail.  Only when the player states that he wants to check out
the booth is graphic detail filled in.  The player is directing the
character's perceptions to pay attention to the contents of the market
booth.

Another interesting element of this is that the server now heavily filters
the amount of information that it sends to a client.  That's easy on the
client and easy on the wire.  Very tough on the server.  The server has to
model and filter all this stuff.  Heavy, heavy demand on the server, but I
believe that this will all be manageable in time.  The model of the user
might have to be more like an arcade than home users.

Anyway, this is something that sits on my 'to do as prototype' list.

JB


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